


Effecting Fate

by shdowstep



Category: Fate/stay night & Related Fandoms, Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Action/Adventure, Cross-Posted on FanFiction.Net, F/M, Romance, Will span entire trilogy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-16
Updated: 2020-12-23
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:00:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 61,488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24748006
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shdowstep/pseuds/shdowstep
Summary: Shiro Emiya: Engineer, Colonist, and Survivor. Arturia Pendragon: Vanguard, Spacer, and War Hero. "It has been said that the Once and Future King would return when she was most needed. With the threat as large as the Reapers? Well, that would certainly qualify as such a time. And who better to accompany a sword than it's sheath?"
Relationships: Emiya Shirou/Artoria Pendragon | Saber
Comments: 12
Kudos: 53





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Many years ago, a prophecy was made. It stated that King Arthur would one day return when she was most needed - to bring back peace to the land. Thus, on her tombstone, it was written "Here lies King Arthur - King Once, and King in the Future", or more commonly known, "The Once and Future King".  
> However, it is never mentioned what "land" she shall return to, does it? Nor does it state that she will return alone.  
> And lastly, it never states that she would return when the threat had already arrived...

The Serpent Nebula.

The gas and dust from the Nebula creates a thick cloud that extends across a vast distance. While visually pleasing, it obscures sight, both physical and electronic, making it a nightmare for those without proper coordinates.

With no planetary mass around, there exists only one thing that makes the system of interest: The Citadel. 

A colossal space station - 45 kilometers in length, 13 kilometers in diameter, and made out of unknown metals. 

Built by the Protheans in years long gone, the Citadel is inhabited by over 13 million people of various species. Though heavily run by the three council races, an incredible amount of diversity could be found throughout the entire station, and many of the more influential races owned an embassy within it.

Inside the human embassy, four men in various uniforms sat inside an office, looking over various files on holo-screens, discussing the contents of them in low tones.

Two men wore blue military dress uniforms and had military styled hair cuts, one with dark hair, the other with gray. The third wore what seemed to be a white, futuristic suit, along with dark hair the same length as the other two. The fourth wore an old fashioned white suit, with a brown scarf that contained a flower design on it. Unlike the other three, he had messy shoulder length hair that was almost iridescent in the light.

Captain David Anderson, one of the Alliance's most decorated special forces operatives.

Admiral Steven Hackett, a top ranking official of the Alliance Navy and commanding officer of the Fifth Fleet.

Ambassador Donnel Udina, humanity's second ambassador to the Council races, and responsible for looking after mankind's interests.

And lastly, Admiral Emerys Myrrdin, another top ranking official that had recently been given a spot on the Advisory Board.

After looking at several different profiles on their holo-screens, the man in the futuristic white suit spoke up.

"Well," Udina said hesitantly, "What about Pendragon? She’s a spacer, and has lived aboard starships most of her life."

A 3D image came up on the table, soon they were looking at a blonde woman with short hair, standing at attention in a military uniform. To the side of the image, several symbols popped up, showing rank and various statistics.

"Pendragon is a good choice. She comes from a military family," Anderson said approvingly, leaning back in his chair and smiling a little. "Her father and I are good friends. She's adopted, and has a brother that's serving as well."

Udina looked at him with an arched eyebrow, "Showing favoritism are we?"

Anderson‘s smile turned into a scowl very quickly, "Of course not." he said sharply, "She proved herself in the Blitz. Even after being taken by surprise while on shore leave, she managed to rally a few others soldiers that were there, as well as the colonists, against the invading forces. Considering the colonists were a mixture of species and people that she had never worked with before, I'd say that that is quite an achievement."

"Indeed." Admiral Hacket stated bluntly. "Quite frankly, she's the only reason Elysium is still standing."

"Hmmm, very well." Udina consented. "And I see she's biotic, correct?"

"Yes, she is. It should be noted that she is currently the only human that has been able to utilize the ‘Biotic Charge’ ability, something that only the Asari have been able to thus far." Anderson smiled fondly once more, "She's a prodigy, and an expert in close up fighting."

"Another point in her favor then." Udina decided. "So, what would you say sets her apart from the others?"

There was a small pause as the two other men thought in silence. 

"She's dedicated." Anderson decided. "That, and she is very talented. She works harder than anybody else on the force, and she's constantly training. Her abilities, her knowledge and execution of tactics, her overwhelming charisma on the battlefield - there's a reason why she's had so much success in her career. While she is able to fight on her own, she excels at leading others."

"Hmmm, very well, she sounds very promising." He turned to another file on his screen. "What about... Emiya? He grew up in the colonies."

The 3D image was replaced with that of a red headed man with kind eyes standing at attention, the statistics and symbols replacing to match this new person.

"He knows how tough it can be out there. His parents were killed when slavers attacked Mindoir." Anderson filled in, looking sadly at the file. "He was... Sixteen when it happened. Resourceful kid. Managed to round up a lot of the kids and other civilians and locked one of the buildings down tight until we managed to get troops over there."

"What about with what happened on Akuze?" Udina asked, "That sort of thing is bound to leave scars."

Anderson gave a small shrug, "Every soldier has scars. Emiya managed to keep most of the unit alive, even if he resorted to... unconventional tactics to do so."

Udina looked at him in concern, "Unconventional tactics? And what were those? The exact methods weren't mentioned in the record."

Admiral Hacket spoke up, "Suicidal tactics” he grunted disapproving, “He figured out that the Thresher Maws relied on vibrations on the surface to hunt. He collected all of the grenades from the men, got what was left of his unit to a rocky outcropping, then drove off while launching grenades. He managed to attract every Thresher Maw in the area."

"The men that survived were all heavily wounded." Anderson cut in, "All were released from military service with full honors due to their injuries. Somehow, Emiya managed to survive. We found him unconscious on top of a Thresher Maw that he had killed. He says he managed to get a full belt of grenades in its mouth, and quite frankly the damage done supports that." he shook his head, "He was extremely lucky that the other Thresher Maw's didn't realize he was there after that."

“I see..." Udina muttered, his eyes wide in surprise. "And he's an Engineer, correct?"

"Yes. He seems to have an instinctual grasp of the stuff." Anderson stated with a fond grin. "When he was first in the army, he was always going around helping fix stuff. It was obvious what field he would go into way before he actually went into it."

"And what would you say sets him apart from the others?", Udina asked the question on his list.

"Similar to Pendragon, Emiya displays a determination that is second to none." Anderson replied, "He trains as hard at his own abilities. He’s also well liked by the men he works with, and has left many good impressions on the people he’s worked with. When possible, he prefers solo missions though. He can, and has worked within a group before, but he truly excels when he's on his own."

Hacket grunted, "Despite this, we generally force him to work with a group." He said bluntly, "Mostly to keep him from attempting any more suicidal tactics."

"I see..." Udina muttered before looking at his file again, "And are these the types of people we want protecting the galaxy?"

"Yes," Anderson said immediately and without a shred of doubt, "Both Emiya and Pendragon have shown time and time again the lengths they're willing to go to in order to protect others. They inspire people in different ways, and have shown they don't care about race." He looked at all three men, "I honestly don't think we could find better people to represent humanity."

Udina nodded slowly while dismissing the 3D image on the table, "Very well then. Now we just need to figure out which of them to recommend," he murmured.

"Why not recommend both of them?" A young voice asked, causing the other three men to look at him. For the first time that evening Admiral Myrrdin had spoken up.

Twirling a pen in his hand lazily while reading the files in front of him, he looked very much at odds with the other men who appeared more serious.

"Hmph. Perhaps," Udina said sarcastically, "it's because the Council told us that they wanted us to nominate ONE person. Usually that means we give them ONE name."

Myrddin gave a carefree shrug, "So we have two qualified people that they can observe instead of one," he said lightly, his eyes sparkling with mischief. Before anybody else could speak, he quickly spoke up, "And you can relax, there’s precedence for this you know."

The other three people immediately paused and looked at the man in confusion, and then at a document he brought up. "The salarians, asari, and turians have all submitted multiple people for a single Spectre examination at one time or another," the man lectured. "While it's _unorthodox,_ and not done very often, it's obvious that it has been done in the past."

Hacket gave Myrddin an arched look, "And you believe that they would be alright with us submitting two candidates?" he asked, to which he received an eager nod.

"Yep! Pendragon and Emiya clearly have different specialties, one with biotics and the other with engineering. One specializes in group tactics and strategy while the other specializes in solo missions and solo combat." He gave them another easy grin, "They complement each other's abilities, and I think it would make for a rather interesting team up."

The other three men looked thoughtful at that, and Udina nodded his acceptance, "The idea has merit," he decided, "And the worst case scenario is the Council gets irritated at us. Since we'll have precedence on our side, there's not much they can do about it. Unless you two have anything against it," He said to Anderson and Hacket, "Then I'll go ahead and make the call."

Anderson shook his head in the negative, and Hacket hummed thoughtfully before looking at Myrddin, "I have just one question." he said, "Have you looked at their psych evaluations?"

The other two men looked confused, and Myrddin tilted his head thoughtfully.

Hacket typed something on his screen and brought up a map of the galaxy and a timeline. "I thought this was interesting," he stated, "But apparently Pendragon and Emiya haven't ever met. In fact, they're often on missions that have put a fair bit of distance between them."

"So?" Udina asked.

It was a valid question. Alliance Space was quite large, and it wouldn't be unusual for two soldiers to never meet.

Hacket shifted in his chair, "They haven't had contact with each other." He repeated, "And yet look at their respective answers to the last question on the evaluation."

With as stressful as their positions could get, both physically and mentally, visits to a psychiatrist were mandatory. The last question that was given was simply 'What keeps you going?'

For Arturia Pendragon, the answer listed was - "I am waiting for somebody important to me."

For Shirou Emiya, the answer listed was - "I am searching for somebody that I once knew."

"Huh!" Myrddin exclaimed with an innocent smile, "Now that's quite the coincidence right there I'd say!"

"Yes, yes, yes, it's very interesting." Udina said impatiently, "But hardly relevant at this time. You can ask them about it later. Do you have any objections to recommending both of them?"

Hacket thought about it while giving a suspicious glance towards Myrddin, who gave an innocent smile, before shaking his head in the negative. 

"Alright then," Udina said, "I'll go ahead and make the call."

And with that, three of the men walked out of the office and Udina started making the necessary arrangements.

* * *

Once out of sight, Admiral Myrddin leaned against the corridor wall and smiled smugly to himself, a few flowers growing from the cracks in the walls. 

_It was finally time. A prophecy two thousand years in the making was finally coming to fruition, and a promise made between a Sword and a Sheath will be kept._

He continued walking through the hallway, eventually making his way through the crowds of the Presidium, lost in his own thoughts. 

Arturia was no longer a king, and the only responsibilities that she had were those that she placed upon herself. She was able to live a life of her own choosing, away from the meddling of prophecy, even if she wasn’t away from the meddling of a certain mage. For that, he was happy for her. 

Of course, knowing her, she would feel obligated to help out wherever she could. It was simply a part of who she was, and one of the reasons she was willing to sacrifice so much. For the sake of the happiness of others, she was willing to take on such a thankless burden. Compared to that, her current position was trivial. 

Yet even without the title of King, she would need allies. People she could trust and that she could confide in. And who better a person to be by her side than the one whom she had fallen for? A man determined to be a hero, and who strived for so long to reunite with her? 

Like her, he was willing to sacrifice much for the happiness of others, especially if SHE was included as one of the ‘others’. Without knowing whether he would succeed in finding her, he never gave up hope. In truth, he doubted she could find another that would be as good an ally as he. 

As he made it to the docks, he absently walked onto his ship, the _Ynys Enlli_ ,making a mental note to himself to make sure that Anderson installed a camera or something on the bridge of the Normandy. He had managed to keep the two in the dark regarding each other so he could see their reactions when they finally reunited, and he wasn’t going to miss it now. 

Being with Shiro again would put her in a good mood, so he was pretty sure that Arturia wouldn’t maim him for that little prank. 

As his ship took off, he smiled mischievously. If they hadn’t been planning on destroying all of sentient life, he would have felt bad for the Reapers.


	2. Arturia's Awakening

_Arturia Pendragon - age 16_

_The sun shone through the clouds, the rays of light bouncing off of the sword that was stabbed in the stone. The sword seemed to glow a gentle light as she stared, and she almost felt like it was calling her._

_Her companion, a strange white haired man with a staff, looked at her with a teasing smile "Well? Today should be the day. Are you ready to remember?"_

_She frowned at that, but just as she was about to ask what he meant the dream shifted, and she was somewhere else - a grassy hill with a setting sun, looking at a boy with red hair and amber eyes. Her heart skipped a beat as she saw him,_

_He looked at her with gentle eyes and a fond smile, and as he opened his mouth -_

KNOCK* *KNOCK* *KNOCK*

* * *

Arturia jumped out of her bunk, her heart beating wildly as she cast her eyes about her spartan room for the source of the noise, just to see her brother smirking at her from the doorway.

"C'mon sis! It's not like you to sleep in like this, especially on the day of your first visit to the Citadel," He said while leaning against the doorframe, his smirk never leaving his face, "What? Were you dreaming of your boyfriend again?"

Feeling her face heat up slightly, she narrowed her eyes at Kay, shifting her legs underneath her as she prepared to launch herself at her brother.

Seeing this and hearing her growl, Kay's grin widened and he quickly backed away, running into his own room, barely dodging the punch that Arturia sent his way and snickered. While his sister was usually polite and composed, he never failed to get some sort of reaction out of her when he teased her about the boy in her dreams.

Now, if said boy actually existed, then he might have had a problem… But he and his dad had done a fairly extensive search throughout the fleet and couldn't find a boy matching his description, so Kay figured it was just her imagination. On the positive side, it appeared that it kept her from being interested in any other guys, so that was a win in his book. And it gave him prime teasing material that never failed to shake her.

Back in her room, Arturia glared at Kay's closed door before taking a few steps back and focused on getting her frustration (and blush) under control.

Living on starships their whole life, she and Kay were used to living in cramped quarters. Unlike Kay's room, her's was relatively spartan, with her personal possessions being limited to a stuffed lion on her bed, a shinai, and several books on the medieval era's of various species.

Sitting down on her bed, she unlocked her diary and started writing down the details of what she remembered from her dream.

Having odd dreams was something that she was used to after years of experiencing them, and her Father had recommended that she write down what she remembered of them. Of growing up with Kay on Earth with no technology, of being frustrated by a white haired prankster, of leading armies… All taking place in the medieval era. They hadn't even spent a lot of time on that era during school when the dreams started!

And then there were the dreams about that boy…

She cursed to herself as her face started heating up. The boy had been about to say something before Kay interrupted! That was the first time that had happened!

The memories she had of the boy were few, but they always FELT important when she was in the dream. It was like her dream self knew something that she didn't. But no matter how hard she tried her dreams refused to cooperate.

Finishing with writing her summary of the dream she began to get ready for the day, putting what had happened behind her. Kay had been telling the truth after all - today was the first time that she was going to see the Citadel, and she was excited to see it.

* * *

Commander Ector and his daughter, Arturia, walked through the hallways of the Citadel hospital. Arturia looked with interest at all of the new people and aliens walking by, and Ector walked alongside her with more reluctance.

This being Arturia's first time on the Citadel, it also marked the first time she had seen another sentient species. He watched with amusement as she attempted to keep her usual composure while staring at a group of Hanar. Chuckling a bit to himself before he thought back to what they were doing here.

"Listen, Cub…" He sighed heavily, "Arturia. Are you sure this is what you want? This isn't something that you can reverse once done."

The hospital that they were at was one that specialized in surgery. More specifically, it was one of the best outside of the asari for those with biotic abilities, and widely considered the best for non-asari surgery in regards to biotics.

Ever since humanities discovery of biotics, it became part of a person's yearly physical to see if they have the ability to use biotics, and Arturia had been diagnosed with having such potential.

Naturally, simply having the potential didn't make it useful. It required the use of an implant, and a biotic amp, in order for the person to be able to do anything notable.

Said implant was positioned at the base of the skull, right next to the brain.

...

And they expected him to be alright with the idea of doing surgery on his precious daughter and placing a foreign object next to her brain?!

And to add to his dislike of the idea, there was the general feeling that most people had towards biotics. The military was one thing - he was well aware that they provided _many_ benefits for biotics to join. But the general populace wasn't nearly as understanding. This wasn't the asari whose entire populace had it, the turians who were almost entirely military, nor the salarians with their logical minds. Even the minor species out there had had quite a bit of exposure to it in one form or another at this point. For humans however, suspicion and paranoia ran rampant amongst civilians regarding biotics, and he doubted it would go away any time soon.

 _Not that the military helped with that image,_ Ector admitted to himself.

In their attempts to train biotics without any interference, the authorities had done their best to convince families that children with biotics were dangerous.

Stupid. Short term benefits with long term downsides.

Unfortunately, nothing he said would dissuade Arturia. To her, this would help her become capable of protecting others more. She had listened to the pros and cons of such a decision, and in her eyes the cons were negligible.

She had long made her decision, and at this point he could only do his best to support her. That's why they were having this surgery here at the Citadel. The whole debacle with Jump Zero was still fresh on everybody's minds, and he wasn't inclined to trust human doctors with this. The asari had been working with biotics for generations, and the salarians were downright terrifying with how much they knew.

The cost was… more than he wanted to admit, but his daughter would face enough challenges in her life as it was, and it was his duty as a father to make those burdens easier to bear where he could.

Arturia had always been mature for her age. While a blessing he wholeheartedly acknowledged most of the time, he dearly wished that she would think of herself more.

Still, she was his daughter, even if not through blood. Both she and Kay were his kids, and he would do his best to make sure that they managed to live a happy life.

* * *

"Listen, Cub…"

Arturia heard her Father sigh, and couldn't help but feel guilty knowing that it was because of her that he was feeling this way.

"Arturia. Are you sure that this is what you want? This isn't something that you can reverse once done."

Though she felt bad about causing him grief, how could she explain in a way that they would understand?

Arturia hated worrying her father and brother, but how could they expect her to do nothing when she had the ability to help?

With humanity still relatively new amongst the stars they were seen as weak by many, which often equated to easy prey. Pirates, raiders, and slavers were common threats on the frontiers. That, in addition to the stories that her Father had told, only emphasized the need for people that were willing to protect.

With that in mind, was it any wonder that she was determined to join the military as her father had?

And as a biotic, she would be better equipped to protect humanity.

To her, it was simple. Her path was obvious.

"If I were to have any doubts, I think it might be a little late to start expressing them, don't you think?" She asked her Father with amusement in her voice.

He gave her a small glare, "You know what I mean," He muttered. "Sure, we've made the appointment and scheduled everything, but it can still be canceled -"

"We've had this discussion months ago," she interrupted, putting her hand on his arm. "This appointment took that long to schedule, and THAT was impressive considering how busy they usually are!"

"And if that's what it takes, then that's what will happen." He stated resolutely, "If you have any doubts about this -"

"I don't," Arturia stated firmly, pausing in the middle of the brightly lit hallway to look him in the eyes, trying to express how she felt. "Everything will be fine, I'm sure of it."

He looked into her eyes for a little bit, "... Heh, I'm afraid that you're too young to be able to use that line on me and for it to have any effect little cub," Ector said with a sad smile, "None of us can know the future."

"Then it only makes sense to give ourselves as many advantages as we can, doesn't it?" Arturia countered with one of his favorite sayings.

"Of course," he agreed readily, "But that which is an advantage in one battle might be a handicap in another. Life never gives you just one battle to face."

"And the battles which will have an advantage will be ones where I am protecting the people" Arturia said firmly, "My _disadvantages_ will simply come in... Social situations. And that is something that I can deal with."

Ector gave another heavy sigh, "But that's not something that you should have to deal with." He gave her an arched look, "You do realize that you're allowed to be selfish occasionally, right?

Arturia paused for a moment, feeling a sense of dejavu at those words, before responding, "Well right now I want to be able to help everybody else… So I suppose I'm being selfish in a way." She concluded with a wry smile.

They stood in companionable silence for a second, before -

"Ahem!"

The two jumped and looked at the source of the noise, seeing a sheepish looking Salarian in a doctors uniform.

"Apologies for ruining the moment," he said, "But we are ready for the operation now, so long as we are still doing it?" Looking at the two of them questioningly.

Arturia coughed and nodded quickly, embarrassed at having been caught by surprise, while Ector simply stood at attention behind her, supporting her.

The Salarian smiled at them, "Excellent! Please, come. Operation for implant and amp fairly routine. Before we begin, if we could just ask standard questions..."

* * *

As she went unconscious for the operation, the last thing Arturia was expecting was to wake up in the middle of a cobbled street.

Looking around in confusion, she found herself surrounded by a heavy mist. Standing up, she cautiously walked through the mist until she could just make out the outlines of numerous small houses on either side of the street.

She recognized this place… Well, bits and pieces of it from her vague recollections of her dreams. Though she wasn't usually able to walk around of her own free will.

 _I… didn't think that I would experience any dreams during the operation_ she thought to herself with a frown. _Let alone one as realistic as this._

With nothing else to do, she started exploring the dreamscape, eventually gaining a better understanding of the area.

Currently, it appeared that she was in a large, empty village. The mist seemed to hang over the entire place, obscuring many details and giving it a ghostly quality. The houses were made of actual wood, and the roofs of thatch. Nearby, she could see a grand castle, with tall imposing white walls and towering spires. It's flags lay still without any wind, and it's banners were furled. A small way away from the village was a forest, and next to that a peaceful lake.

As she explored the area, she slowly felt herself grow anxious. This wasn't like any dream that she had had before - it felt too real, more… Solid, than any dream she had previously had. But what really had her on edge was the feelings that were being evoked within her as she walked past some of the locations.

The cottage that felt like home, the empty church yard with a stone that filled her with a sense of purpose, the castle that was filled with so many confusing emotions both positive and negative she could hardly stand to walk near it, and the lake that filled her with peace?

At one point, she actually thought she saw a lady walking by the shores of the lake, but found the place empty once she arrived.

To top off all of the strangeness, as she walked through the village, something seemed to thrum in the air. A quiet rumbling that was just quiet enough to not be heard, but still felt. It seemed to echo through the village, making things seem more… Substantial. In the distance the flags on top of the castle seemed to stir with every thrum, and they would briefly unfurl and show the world an image of a proud lion, the entire castle seeming to hum in anticipation.

With her nerves climbing, she walked faster through the streets, trying to find the source, the repeating thoughts she told herself that this was simply a dream failing to convince her.

This was different, yet she had no idea what THIS was.

Finally coming to the edge of the village she hadn't been to yet, she stopped and felt her breath leave her as her eyes widened.

In front of her lay what could only be a dragon, the thrumming seemed to be coming from it. Larger than some of the Cruisers that she had been on, it's scales were deep blue and gold. It was currently sleeping, curled around the base of a hill - ignoring the world, but appearing to be there to protect the hill itself.

Shaking herself from her daze, she slowly made her way to the dragon. Despite its size, she didn't feel scared of it, nor the power that seemed to flow off of it. If anything, she was confused at NOT feeling any sort of fear. She reached out and touched the dragon, only for her eyes to widen as her legs buckled at the surge of power that ran through her, and she immediately snatched her hand away.

She gazed at the dragon for a while longer, taking in its entire length, before focusing on the hill that it was wrapped around. The land around her felt like it was holding its breath in anticipation, like something momentous was going to happen, and she was unsure as to what that would be.

Making her way to the top of the hill, she saw two items sticking out of the ground that once again took away her breath.

The first was a golden sword - it's intricate engravings and gold decorations not taking away from the functionality she KNEW it would have. Glowing with a proud, inner light, for her to call it beautiful simply did not do it justice.

Resting against it was a large sheath, it's level craftsmanship not inferior to the blade it rested against in any way. Golden as well, decorated with blue enamel and inscribed with runes she couldn't understand.

She realized she was holding her breath as she looked at the two items, and found that she was unable to look away. Blinking, she felt tears rolling down her cheeks, though she wasn't able to figure out why. Reaching out, she touched the sword, and stiffened when she heard the dragon wake up behind her, giving out a tremendous roar of victory, a large surge of power flowing across her dreamscape.

["Doctor!"

"Using biotics already?! Should not happen till AFTER practice! A LOT of practice!"]

The land seemed to shudder, and the mist around the village started to lift. The castle solidified, it's banners and flags unfurling, and the drawbridge lowered. Streams of blue energy seemed to flow in between the cracks of the ground, and the lake glowed with unearthly power.

The dragon settled down and went back to sleep, and with it the spike of power. The land and the village seemed to calm, though it did not go to it's previous state of existence.

Arturia never noticed though, her attention focused on the sword as it was.

Upon touching the sword… She could not begin to describe the feeling. Techniques flowed through her mind - impossible techniques, but were done without the use of biotics. Tactics… Politics... Knowledge…

Memories.

["Her brain activity is way too high! Increase the sedative!"]

She was a King that waged war to defend the people of her homeland.

She was one who would wield a sword for chivalry and justice.

She was the one who pushed back the Angles, Saxons, and Jutes in their invasion of the British Isles.

The memories flowed through her as she stood there and slowly drew her sword, Excalibur, from the ground, and without her noticing her clothing slowly changed to that of an armored dress, fit for battle.

The memories didn't replace her - nor did they change who she was. The core of her very being, of her personality, remained unchanged. The memories simply _reminded_ her of who she was.

She was Arturia 'Arthur' Pendragon, King of Britain, and the King of Knights.

As the memories came back, she saw them all once more. She saw her childhood with Ector and Kay, the training with Merlin, and her eventual pulling of the sword Calburn from the stone. She felt the fear of losing an ally at every battle she went through, and the accompanying guilt that came when she saw those that were killed. She experienced the moments with her knights, and the joy that that brought.

And then she experienced the crushing despair as she watched everything that she worked for crumble in the wake of rebellion, eventually leading to that final battle on the hill of Camlann.

["Umm, Doctor? The IV has been removed…"

"Well put it back in!"

"... Did you want to try getting close to that?"]

Those memories then flowed into that of the Fourth Holy Grail War - of working with Kiritsuga, and the failure of that war. And then the Fifth Holy Grail War happened and she met her beloved, Shiro.

Her mind and memories stabilized as she focused her memories on Shiro. His looks, the way he smiled at her, his caring heart, and his desire to protect everybody. An impossible dream that he sought despite it's unreachability.

She thought of those days in the past when she trained him. While nowhere near her own level of skill, his rate of learning was extremely impressive, as was his ability to survive despite the odds against him.

She was his Sword, and he was her Sheath. It was for him that she waited for years in Avalon, and for who she would willingly wait longer still. Further, it was for her that she knew that he searched continually for. He was the one that understood her best, and she him.

She thought back and tried to shift through her memories, to determine what happened. She remembered the continuous grind of time as she waited, waited oh so long to the point where the grind had long since become monotonous. And then, from all around her she felt a surge of magic, and then… Nothing.

The only thing after that was her life beginning anew.

She growled in annoyance, her hand tightening around Excalibur reflexively as she began to feel worried.

As long as she was in Avalon, he would know where he needed to go to find her. That was the whole point.

If he arrived there and she wasn't there... what would he think?

Just as she thought this, the land started to fade and everything went black.

* * *

Opening her eyes, Arturia blinked the sleep out of her eyes, feeling a burn at the base of her neck, and blinked in surprise at the state of the room.

The equipment and machinery were all thrown around and shattered like they had been in a hurricane, with her being the center of the storm. Looking blearily at the door, she saw the doctor peering in.

Seeing she was awake, he walked in with a practiced smile, "Hello Miss. Pendragon," he said, "If you don't mind me asking... Do you know what just happened?"

* * *

_Present Time - year 2183_

Command Pendragon woke up, quickly shaking the sleep from her mind. Looking at the time, she sighed slightly at seeing how she still had several hours before she needed to be up.

How long had it been since she had thought of that day?

Despite her initial burst that day in the hospital room, she was unable to 'instinctively' use mass effect fields again, to the sorrow of many of the doctors. Afterwards, her father had insisted that the implant be looked at by an independent party, and had even hired an asari specialist to train her in her new biotic powers.

When in private, she had attempted to use her old abilities, but was disappointed in the results. It wasn't that the power wasn't there - even though she had a different body, she could FEEL the dragon core inside of her still. It was just… Dormant. She was only able to force a trickle of energy through it.

Still, she was never one to bemoan about that which she didn't have. Though it took considerable effort, she was able to replicate her most common moves with biotics. The theory was different, as well as the mechanics, but the results were well worth the effort she put in. And that which she wasn't able to replicate, she simply replaced using other abilities or technology.

She slowly got up and stretched, going through a few light exercises. One thing that had caught her off guard as the years went by was the way she grew. Without Avalon's blessing, her body was free to age past 16 years. After spending a lifetime with a younger body, she was never expecting it to ever mature.

Not that she was complaining about it, but her new height was STILL something that would take her off guard every once in a while.

As soon as she finished she started making her way to the galley, deciding that she might as well get something to eat now. The galleys were always staffed due to the necessities of having round the clock shifts on ship, and hunger was always the enemy.

Even if the food served wasn't very appealing way to defeat said enemy…

Her stomach grumbled unhappily, but she steadfastly ignored it. While not very appetizing, the food was better than the fare that she and her knights had to eat, so she was able to ignore it's deficiencies.

As she made her way to the galley she pretended to not notice the looks that some of the crew gave her. That was another small thing that being a king had given her, she reflected.

Honestly, at this point, she wasn't sure if they looked in awe because she was an N7, or if it was because she was the Hero of the Skyllian Blitz.

After regaining her memories, she continued with her decision to join the army. Her desires remained the same - she wanted to protect the people, and was determined to make sure that this time she succeeded.

Even if her beloved helped her acknowledge that her reign wasn't a mistake, the fact remains that her kingdom fell into ruin with her unable to stop it. Such a thing would not happen again, that she swore. And the best way she saw to accomplish that was through the military.

Of course, not being a king, she had to start at basic training with all of the other beginners, despite being able to show how skilled she was. That, she decided, was definitely something that she could have done without.

She had gone through hellish training in the past of course. Before, she had been trained in the arts of knighthood from the age of eight, and even in this life she had Ector as a father, so she was still very much fit. That wasn't it. It was being at the bottom of the pecking order, and having idiots yell orders at her that she disliked. There wasn't a sword that she could pull and immediately become promoted after all - she had to go through the process just like everybody else.

That, naturally, took time. But oh so worth it.

If there was anything that she regretted, it was not being able to find any 'knights'.

Not her old knights of course - to her knowledge, she alone had been reincarnated here. Even Ector and Kay had no knowledge of the past like she did, much to her confusion - but people like her old knights. She had made friends of her fellow squad members, and she would never disparage them, but she had yet to find anybody that truly stood out to her. The Knights of the Round Table weren't merely men of strength and skill. They were those who strove to be the BEST, who strove for an ideal of one sort or another, and whose loyalty to Camelot was unwavering.

Even those that betrayed her never did so with the thought of betraying their country.

But the men and women that she had worked with thus far, though many were strong and many skilled, she couldn't help but feel that they were lacking in something.

Arturia grabbed some food and sat down at one of the tables, starting to eat without any enthusiasm, when -

"Hey Commander!"

Arturia smiled as she saw a tall, brunette woman in a technician uniform - one of the few people on the ship that was truly comfortable around her. "Good morning Tess," She greeted.

Tess plopped herself down and looked at Arturia with what she recognized as her 'gossiping' grin. "So, THIS girl managed to figure out who you're going to be working with!" She practically sang, "You can praise me for my genius at any point. Go on, I'll wait."

Arturia gave a small snort, grinning back at her, "Oh really?" She asked, "Is this anything like when you thought that Vega was going to be transferred to Earth?"

Tess blushed, waving her hands frantically "That wasn't my fault!" She declared while pouting, "How was I supposed to know that the Admiral was talking about something else?"

"Hmmm, of course." Arturia stated, with a teasing lilt, "Perhaps you shouldn't rely on information that you get while eavesdropping?"

"It's not eavesdropping if they're talking about it while nearby!" She protested, "And besides, this wasn't something that I learned by listening into anyone. I heard about it from a friend. And this news? I just have to say that I. Am. Jealous."

Arturia raised her eyebrow at that. She had received word that she was to be transferred to the Normandy under Captain Anderson, but Tess hadn't seemed as excited about that as she did now. "Even more jealous than the idea that I'll be serving on a prototype frigate?" She asked.

"Yes!" Tess exclaimed, before looking conflicted, "Well, maybe more on par with that part… Look, it's exciting, alright? So could you at least look excited?"

"Maybe I could if you actually told what it is I should be excited about," Arturia said while finishing up her meal.

"Agh, ok! So, my friend told me that he also knew somebody that was being transferred to the Normandy. It looks like you're going to be working with…" She paused for suspense, looking at Arturia excitedly, "The Chef Commander!"

Arturia blinked in confusion, "The… Chef Commander?" She asked skeptically,

Tess wilted a little bit, "Hey, give me a break, I made it up on the spot," she sulked. "But it's true! He's an N7 like you that actually enjoys cooking! My friend says that some nights when he can't sleep he'll actually cook a bunch of stuff in the galley and give it to whoever is around, and he says it tastes AMAZING. They apparently have created a system that lets them know if he ever goes to the galley, so there is always a group waiting for him."

Arturia's stomach made another grumble and she looked at the unsatisfying remains of her own food. A look that Tess mirrored. "So," She continued, "Now you see why I'm jealous."

"I suppose," she responded, silently berating her stomach. "And you say that he's an N7?"

"Apparently. Why? Do you think you know him?" Tess gasped, "Is he your mystery boyfriend you won't show me any pictures of?!"

A stab of sadness struck Arturia, and she ignored it as best as she could, "No, I don't think I know him. But then, that doesn't surprise me too much. You know I dislike socializing with a lot of people."

"Yeah yeah yeah, I know." Tess said dismissively, "Honestly, it's gotten to the point that I think you're just making him up to keep the admirers at bay."

Arturia chuckled sadly as she brought her tray up and headed over to put it away, "He really isn't Tess, I can promise you that. Though I will admit that nobody will be able to replace him."

And that was true. Though she worried about whether he had arrived in Avalon to find her missing, or if he even now searched for her, she knew that nobody would be able to take the place that her beloved sheath had in her heart.

Tess snorted, getting up herself and started heading out of the room. "If you say so. Sounds to me like this perfect guy doesn't call, write, or text, nor has he visited in years, so I think that you're better off with somebody else. Maybe this Commander Emiya will be able to replace that no sho- EEP!"

Tess had never seen Arturia move that fast, even on the battlefield. Arturia had her arm clasped and was staring at her hard enough that she swore she could almost feel it.

"... What was that name?"


	3. A Sheath Stirs

_Shirou - age 16_

Mindoir - year 2170

Located in the Attican Traverse, Mindoir held a special place in the hearts of humanity, for it was the first human colony to be founded for no other reason than to serve as a home for those who no longer wished to live on earth.

Not out of necessity, escape from oppression, overcrowding, or for more resources. Simply another home.

Founded by the Mindoir Colony Corporation LTD in 2153, the planet was originally settled before the First Contact and served as an agricultural settlement of 100,000 settlers. Now, years after the First Contact it continued to be focused on agriculture, but it also did decent trade with Illium, and currently could boast of having 350,000 citizens across several cities.

Despite it being extremely early in the day cycle, one could still see several people working the various drones and machinery in the fields. Away from the fields however, the road was empty save for one man enjoying the brisk air.

Kiritsugu Emiya walked down the road at an unhurried pace, making his way to the shooting range while enjoying the early morning air. In the past, he had only been able to come home sporadically, and he felt guilty for leaving his wife to deal with their two kids.

Necessary perhaps, with his job, but something that he regretted nonetheless.

They had had little Ilya years ago, and due to complications in the pregnancy Irisviel had been unable to have any more kids. Not that that slowed his wife down at all, and some years later she expressed her desire to give Ilya a younger sibling.

One visit to the adoption center, and they had adopted Shirou into their lives, a poor boy that suffered from amnesia.

She never complained about having to raise their two kids almost by herself, but he knew that it must be difficult, even with the money that he kept sending to help. That was why he was grateful that he was able to be more in their lives these last few years.

Even if the reasons for such a thing were… Less than ideal.

He stopped his walk as he felt a stab of pain in his chest, forcing him to cough violently into his hand for a few seconds. Once he got his cough under control he began walking once more, ignoring the wet feeling on his hand as he brushed it against his dark clothes, already knowing that he'd see blood there.

 _For as many advancements that humanity made in the medical field, it seems we still do our best to ensure that the ways to kill people always keep pace_ Kiritsugu reflected.

Though his future was bleak, he had already managed to live past what the doctors had anticipated, and he would push past even further if he had anything to say about it.

He arrived at the shooting range and smiled ruefully when he saw that the door had been hacked open. Walking in, he heard the steady thump in the back and followed the sound, eventually leaning against the door and watched his son as he shot distant targets using an Omni-bow.

Years before, when they had first adopted Shirou, his class had asked all of the students what they wanted to be when they grew up and why. There were the usual answers - an N7, an idol, an actor… stuff like that. The reasons were also rather standard - it looked cool, they were amazing, etc.

It didn't surprise Kiritsugu - They were kids after all.

When they got to Shirou the answer that he gave, without any doubt or hesitation in his voice, was a hero.

Afterwards, Kiritsugu had talked to him to ask him about his answer. While not an unusual answer for an 8 year old, it was the reason why that had him confused. When asked, Shirou had given one of his bright smiles and replied that he wanted to save people, and so he could meet the pretty lady.

8 year old Shirou then went on to explain that he kept seeing the pretty lady in his dreams, and that he needed to be a hero so he could actually meet her. Kiritsugu wasn't sure why being a hero was a requirement for this, but Shirou didn't have a shred out doubt about it.

As time went on Shirou hadn't brought it up again, and Kiritsugu and Irisviel figured that the 'pretty' lady must have been old memories of his mother. Shirou and Ilya continued to grow, and Shirou started showing an aptitude for fixing appliances. When he asked about it, Shirou would look confused at the question, and say that it just seemed to make sense as he worked on it.

Kiritsugu thought that Shirou must have forgotten about becoming a hero and the 'pretty lady', and didn't think anything more of it. However, it was a couple years after that that Irisviel told him that Shirou had started his own exercise and fighting practice routine, and she wanted him to help.

It was after asking Shirou about his reasons for training that he learned that Shirou hadn't forgotten about being a hero in order to help others. He didn't say anything about the 'pretty lady' this time, but Kiritsugu was amused to see the the redness in his cheeks, and suspected that that reason remained as well.

Though he was unable to remain for long, he worked out a proper training plan for Shirou and gave it to him to keep. He was honestly surprised when he visited next to hear that young Shirou had been keeping to the plan religiously, which wasn't something he expected out of a child. Not only that, but he was always helping his mother and sister with small tasks around the house, and he suspected that kids at his school took advantage of him due to his helping nature.

When asked about it though, Shirou said he could never tell if they were trying to take advantage of him or if they honestly needed help, and he'd rather help them and be taken advantage of then NOT help them if they needed the help.

" _Besides," Shirou said with a bright smile, "I like helping other people! If it's to help somebody else, does it matter?"_

Seeing Shirou do all of this at the age of 13 honestly made Kiritsugu a little worried for his son.

He talked with Irisviel about it, and they eventually had to restrict how much he did because they were worried he was going to burn himself out. Shirou complied very quickly when Kiritsugu said he wouldn't help Shirou anymore if he didn't tone it down.

They were probably the only parents that had to punish their child by preventing said child from doing work.

It wasn't till this last year when Shirou turned 16 that Kiritsugu took him and started training him in using guns.

It was at that time that he found, to his great amusement, that Shirou COULD get frustrated at something.

He was awful at it.

Oh, the assembling and disassembling of the gun he could do with ease, and though he didn't like the idea of killing people he wasn't opposed to the guns. His aim was just... _atrocious._

Now, that wasn't usually an insurmountable challenge in and of itself, especially when one had the determination that Shirou was oft to display. But even after training Shirou for hours on end using various methods, Kiritsugu was beginning to doubt that Shirou would ever get better than average, which would put a huge damper on Shirou's plans to become a hero.

Being a hero in this day and age could be extremely complex or very simple, all depending on your definition of what a hero is.

A doctor was a hero, saving the lives of those in peril.

A detective was a hero, stopping those who have committed crimes before they could commit more.

A lawyer was a hero, protecting those on the battlefields of the courts.

Even an assassin could be a hero, dealing with threats in the dark.

So that brought the question of what kind of hero Shirou wished to be. Shirou's answer was one that could save anyone, to help anyone in need, and to protect those in need of protection.

A difficult order indeed, especially with his future options limited from being on Mindoir.

And so Kiritsugu had brought up the possibility of joining the military - there, he would receive even more training that would help him help others, and the military was sent to areas where people often needed help. The only downside to this was that joining the military would put constraints on him, forcing him to follow the orders of others. But even that restriction could be reduced by climbing the ranks.

… But that wouldn't work if Shirou couldn't shoot. It didn't matter how physically fit he was, or how great his desires - on a battlefield where death came from a distance you needed to respond in kind.

The problem frustrated Shirou to no end, and he would spend hours upon hours at the range trying to get better, and Kiritsugu did his best to help.

He found it ironic that a solution was presented through a shady contact that WASN'T one of his own.

On their way back from a job a group of Talon Mercenaries from Omega dropped by the colony. He wasn't sure what their job was, and it wasn't any of his business. He simply made sure to keep a close eye on them while they were here.

Somehow Shirou met with them and was fascinated with their weapon of choice - an Omni-Bow.

An attachment to the widely used Omni-tool, the Omni-bow combined the fabrication module of the Omni-tool with mass effect suspension to create a surprisingly deadly weapon for such a primitive concept. Generally looked down upon and not used by most of the galaxy, Shirou was fascinated with it and asked if he could try it.

At first Kiritsugu had expected them to simply laugh at the request, and they did seem amused, but to his surprise they actually acquiesced eventually.

 _Note to self: Talon Mercenaries are susceptible to bribery via Shirou's cooking._ Kiritsugu thought to himself wryly.

To his surprise, upon trying the bow, Shirou was able to make every shot without fail.

And with that, his problem was solved. He would still need to be able to shoot a gun, but once in the military Shirou could prove his worth with the Omni-Bow, and he wouldn't be held back.

Shaking himself out of his thoughts, Kiritsugu pushed himself from the wall and knocked against the base of the doorway, announcing himself to Shirou, who stiffened and stopped shooting, looking back at Kiritsugu with a sheepish expression.

Kiritsugu chuckled to himself and raised an eyebrow at Shirou, "You know, breaking and entering is against the law," he stated in a amused tone, "As the leader of the colony militia, I think it's part of my duties to report you."

Shirou rubbed the back of his head awkwardly, "... Sorry dad," he muttered, "I couldn't sleep, and..." he gestured to the bow and the targets.

Kiritsugu understood. When Shirou was stressed out, he often did either more training or cooked. Although Iriesviel was currently working at the hospital, Ilya's room was pretty close to the kitchen, so there was no way to cook without waking Ilya.

The shooting range, however, was within walking distance to their house. He'd need to have Shirou tell him how he hacked the door this time.

Nodding to himself, Kiritsugu walked up to Shirou and leaned against the railing next to him, looking down the range. "Same dream?" He asked while looking at him with a teasing look in his eye, and Shirou quickly shook his head, "No, it wasn't her…" he muttered, his face blushing, and Kiritsugu smirked to himself.

Shirou rarely mentioned his dream girl anymore, mostly because Irisviel and his sister kept on teasing him about her, but Kiritsugu knew that he still saw her in dreams occasionally. He was curious that Shirou would still have the same dream of her, even 8 years after they had adopted him, and that he still thought that becoming a hero would allow him to meet her. However, it provided Shirou with motivation, so he wouldn't worry about it yet.

The more motivated Shirou was, the stronger he would strive to be.

The stronger he was, the likelier he and his wife wouldn't have to bury a son.

It was the horror of every parent - the idea that they would outlive their own child. Kiritsugu might be dying himself, but he would do whatever he could to ensure that Shirou had the tools needed to survive.

Shirou continued, "This was something else, I swear. It just felt so… real. The person in it was warning me about something that was going to happen today. After I woke up I just had this really bad feeling, and I couldn't get back to sleep. And, well…" he gestured to the area. "Here I am."

Kiritsugu hummed thoughtfully for a bit, "Well, at least this dream wasn't like some of your other dreams," he offered.

A grimace was all he got in return, "This one felt different," Shirou said with a nervous look, "Ever since I woke up I've been on edge, like something bad is going to happen."

They stood in companionable silence for a bit, before Kiritsugu pushed off the rail and stood up straighter, "If it will help, I can call the other members of the militia and see if anybody has noticed anything," he said. _It wasn't like it would hurt anything, and it's always good check-in with some of the others._

Shirou looked a little relieved, "It might… thanks dad," he said with a more relaxed smile.

Kiritsugu clapped Shirou's arm, "C'mon, your mother will kill us both if she finds out that you were up this early instead of sleeping on a school day."

Shirou winced a little and complied, and the two of them started making their way back home.

They walked back in silence under the early morning sky, listening to the sounds of distant machinery in the fields. As they were about to reach the house though, Kiritsugu's froze in shock and his blood ran cold at the sound of a siren in the distance.

A necessity of all colonies in the Attican Traverse, where pirates and raiders abounded, the warning system of Mindoir had never been sounded since the colony had been founded. A mixture of luck, how well known the planet was, proximity to the Alliance Navy, and the size of the colony discouraged that.

To compound his growing fear, his radio sounded, and he quickly answered it, growing paler as he heard the report. His thoughts went immediately to his wife, who was currently working at the hospital.

It didn't look like there would be a need for a random check-in tonight it seems.

* * *

Walking home, Shirou couldn't help but reflect more on the dream that he had had.

He hadn't told the entire truth to Kiritsugu. But honestly, the rest just seemed too… personal, in a way that was hard to explain.

_The person that he met in the dream was kneeling on a grassy hill surrounded by swords, holding both a sword and a sheath that were usually leaning against each other in her lap._

_Tall and beautiful, with long golden hair and sapphire blue eyes, she was easily the second most beautiful lady that Shirou had seen._

_After observing her for a second, she raised her head and Shirou found himself frozen as she appeared to be judging his soul. After what seemed like a long time she relaxed, and gave him a soft smile, a small glint of approval in her eyes._

" _Even after having your memories sealed, you still cherish her." She stated in a voice that sounded like the rushing of water. "Without knowing why, you work tirelessly to be with her once more."_

_She shifted slightly, "It is through your actions from before that you have earned my approval," she continued, "And it is through your actions since you've been here that has reaffirmed to me that you are worthy of holding my Arturia's heart."_

_As soon as she said the name 'Arturia', Shirou's entire mindscape seemed to shudder, giant gears in the sky struggling to turn, and in his mind Shirou saw an image of the girl from his dreams as his eyes widened and heart lurched._

' _Arturia, is that her name?' Shirou thought to himself, already making sure to memorize it._

_Ever since he was young and had been adopted, he knew that she was important even as he was unsure how he knew that. He couldn't even explain why becoming a hero was a step to meeting her, yet he knew of it without a shadow of a doubt._

_Not that that was the only reason why he desired to become a hero - He truly did want to save everybody he could. Such a thing was extremely important to him in a way that couldn't be explained. It just so happened that by becoming a hero he could meet her and figure out why she was so important to him._

… _Somehow._

_He was a little hazy on the details on that._

_His attention snapped back to the lady when he saw her remove the sword and sheath from her lap and stood up, slowly making her way to where Shirou stood until she was in front of him, placing a hand on his chest._

_Shirou stood frozen, unsure of what to say, and unable to move._

" _As things were, you would not have been able to meet her for a very long while, if at all," She stated while watching him with sad and gentle eyes, "It is for that reason I agreed to that sycophant's plan." Her lips twitched in annoyance before it became smooth once more, "I wish for Arturia to be happy, and she has given her heart to you. Therefore, I would have you returned to her." Her hand moved up to his temple, and for a second if felt like something shifted in his head before she removed it. "I realize that this doesn't make sense right now, but it will very soon. There is limited mana available, so this might take a while, but understanding will come."_

_She moved back to the sword and sheath, picking them both up and kneeled back down. "I'm afraid that our time grows short, for you will need to prepare yourself" she stated, "Today will be a dangerous day for you and yours, and you will need all of your wits about you."_

_With that, the dreamscape seemed to shimmer, and Shirou soon found himself waking up in his bed, a feeling of foreboding over his head and a headache within._

Since then Shirou had been unable to get rid of the feeling that something was going to happen. Something bad. That, and his headache refused to let up. He had hoped that some practice would help, but it hadn't. It was like he was just on the edge of remembering something big… but for all that he tried he could not make that final leap.

When the siren started his mind immediately going on high alert, the sense of foreboding he had spiking.

He heard the sound of a radio, and saw Kiritsugu put one to his ear, slowly growing pale.

He turned to Shirou and, in the most authoritative tone he had heard the old man use, "Shirou, I need you to grab the van and take your sister to the shelter under the school. Here," he tossed him some keys, "Go round the neighborhood and get the kids as well. Lock the shelter and STAY. THERE. Do you understand?" He ordered.

"B-But I can help you guys!" Shirou protested, "I've been getting better with a gun, and I have this," he gestured to the Omni-bow at his side, "You guys might need help to - "

"I do need help" Kiritsugu interrupted him, a bit of desperation in his voice, "I **need** you to take your sister and the other kids to the shelter. I **need** somebody to be there to protect them in case this goes even worse than it already is. Now, do you understand?" He questioned again, staring at him with his eyes.

Seeing Shirou hesitate, he pressed on in a cold voice, "As part of being a hero you have to know when to press forward, and when to let somebody else go while you stay behind. Let me do my job as a father and protect you. _Please_." His voice softening at the end.

Shirou stared at him for a few seconds longer before nodding in assent, gripping the keys in his hand.

Seeing his agreement, Kiritsugu visibly relaxed, "Good. Hurry and do that. With any luck, this will simply be an over-reaction and I'll see you later tonight, ok?"

Without waiting for a reply, he turned and ran for his own car, quickly getting in and starting it.

_He's not going to make it…_

_He was on the porch with Kiritsugu, the older man looking exhausted and in pain. The image shimmered and was replaced with a funeral, with him looking at a coffin, tears running down his face._

Shirou wasn't sure what told him that, but the thought made him feel as if he was doused with freezing water.

"Dad!" He called out desperately before Kiritsugu could drive out of the driveway, and saw the car pause briefly, the window sliding down.

Shirou struggled with what to say for a second, feeling unsure, before giving him a hesitant smile, "Good luck, and… I love you dad."

Though they both knew that they loved each other, it wasn't something that they often said to each other.

Kiritsugu's eyes widened for a second before returning the smile, "Love you too Shirou," He returned, "Tell Ilya I love her as well." And with that, the car tore out of the driveway and drove off.

Shirou looked on in worry for a bit before launching into action, quickly running into the house to wake up Ilya.

* * *

"C'mon everybody! Hurry and move into the shelter!" Ilyasviel von Einzbern shouted out, herding everybody through the doors while looking around nervously. She and a few adults were organizing everybody into the shelter as best as they could.

With the constant fear of raiders, each colony had a series of shelters built throughout the colony with each sector being assigned a shelter to go to in the event of something bad happening.

With a population of 350,000 people there was a need for many shelters. The one that their sector was assigned to was under the school.

As they, and others, were making their way into the shelter, Shirou stared at the controls with a sinking feeling. While driving to the shelter, he had seen three large alien frigates flying in the distance while firing at targets on the ground, and on their radio they had heard that there was a larger arc-ship currently in orbit around the planet, presumably to take cargo.

Human cargo.

This... wasn't a small operation. Frigates? An Arc-Ship? These were slavers. And they were fully prepared.

Each of the shelters were made out of heavily reinforced materials, and were located underground. Really, the only weak point that they had were their entrances. In particular, the console that opened the doors.

This was known of course, the engineers weren't stupid, and so the consoles were heavily encrypted with the best the Alliance could offer.

 _But_ , Shirou thought, _these shelters were built before the First Contact._

The encryptions were the best that the Alliance had offered at the time, but there had been a LOT of upgrades since then.

Upgrades that these shelters didn't participate in.

Shirou wasn't sure of the exact reasons, but he imagined complacency was a factor. After all, Mindoir was a large and well known colony, so who would attack them?

Against regular raiders it probably wouldn't matter much, but against slavers who came fully prepared? What were the odds that they were able to hack older tech such as this?

If that was the case, then the shelters would become death traps.

But… Shirou knew a way to prevent that.

When he had decided on the military as a career choice, he made sure to look at the various options they had, and the position of Engineer had appealed to him.

He had always had an instinctive grasp of electronics and hardware -

 _Structural Grasp…_ His headache spiked, causing him to grimace.

Furthermore, the position of Engineer also dealt with medi-gel application and usage. As somebody that desired to be a hero that could save anybody, that immediately caught his attention.

Knowing the position he wanted, he had trained as much as he could in those areas, which is how he knew about this particular weakness in the shelters.

Not that the fix required much knowledge to implement. Really, it was more like burning one end of the bridge. Destroying the usage of the console on this end, while keeping it intact on the inside.

The problem was that it required him to be on this side of the shelter to do it…

 _It's never wrong to want to save somebody…_ He clenched his eyes shut, feeling frustrated that the headache wouldn't go down.

To be honest, he had already decided to do it… He was just very much aware that his sister would NEVER forgive him for doing it.

"Otouto?" Ilya called from within the shelter, and he glanced at her tall form, blinking in surprise when he briefly saw the image of a smaller Ilya looking at him with a sad smile. " _Onii-san?_ "

He blinked, and the image was gone. _But why would she call me onii-san? She's older…_

"Otouto, everybody's inside now, we're just waiting for you." He gave her a hesitant smile, and her face darkened with suspicion, "Shirou? Whatever you're thinking, don't do -"

He didn't let her say any more, quickly activating the shutdown procedure and sealing the shelter door, feeling guilty at the look of fear on his sister's face. It took him a few more minutes to short out the console on his end, further sealing the door.

It was still possible to open it from the inside, but after what he did, it would be more difficult. The other colonists would prevent Ilya from opening the door for him.

He quickly made his way to the front of the school, quickly hacking and locking the doors behind him. They wouldn't last long against any sort of assault, but he just wanted to throw some obstacles in the path of potential intruders.

Standing at the front of the school, he quickly debated on where to go.

Shirou was very much aware that he couldn't contribute to the fighting… Unknown number of enemies, as well as unknown _quality_ of enemies. According to the radio they had mentioned Batarians, but that really didn't mean much of anything. There was a lot of fighting happening, and it sounded like there were a lot of people dying…

_People screaming in pain, the dead were rising and attacking the living. Pain twisting inside of him, seeing the suffering of others. He wasn't strong enough to save everybody… So for now, he just had to focus on saving who he could. Failing that, he needed to make sure that HE lived… It was the first rule of a knight, to make sure to save yourself… She would never forgive him if he died because he was careless._

Shirou shook his head, clutching it in his hands. _What the heck is happening to me?_

It hurt to admit it - it hurt a lot - but he knew that he wasn't strong enough to help fight. The number of enemies was too great, and Mindoir was too underprepared. Now that this building had been secured, he should find a place to hole up until the military managed to arrive…

And if he happened to find anybody on the way there that needed help, then he could scarcely be blamed for helping them, right?

There was a rudimentary sewer system that was in place throughout the colony. The city planners were ambitious, and were planning something big. And to their credit, it was turning out very well, according to what he had heard. But right now it was still not finished, and there were many places to hide down there.

One of Kiritsugu's training methods had been… A version of hide and seek down there. Shirou had no idea where Kiritsugu got that good at sneaking, but he was absolutely brutal with taking Shirou down without him noticing.

Needless to say, he got really good at hiding, even if he had yet to be able to find Kiritsugu when it was his turn to seek.

With that decision made, he headed over there to where he knew an opening was, doing his best to ignore both the headache and steady flow of images that he was seeing. He would try to sort his head out when he got to the sewers.

He quickly started making his way through the streets, keeping to the buildings as best as he could. The place felt eery without the usual hussle and bussle of early morning business, and with the sound of gunfire and shouts faint in the background. All of that was in the distance though, until -

"NO NO NO! P-PLEASE! LE-LET ME GO!"

Shirou froze at the shriek, flattening himself against the wall of the building, carefully peaking around the corner.

There, down the street, he could see a group of four batarians and a teenage human girl. The girl was on the ground, her leg bleeding profusely, while the batarians appeared to be laughing at her. Each batarians wore chipped armor, and had an assortment of weaponry. Their helmets were currently down, and Shirou felt his hands clench at the smirks they were giving the girl.

The batarians had most likely been part of a larger group, with these four deciding to break off and chase after the girl for some 'fun'.

 _Ok, how can I do this…_ Shirou desperately thought, deploying his Omni-bow, but not yet firing. There were four of them, and they had a hostage on hand who couldn't get away easily…

He didn't have long to think before he saw the batarian closest to the girl pull out his weapon, point it at the girl, and pull the trigger. He saw a brief flash of electricity, and the girl's shrieks increased dramatically, before turning into desperate sobs.

Shirou's sight turned red.

His headache spiked once more, and his mind became flooded with info.

' _I am the bone of my sword'_

Shirou stiffened in surprise, the flood of information briefly overwhelming him. Once again, images and memories assaulted him, and the images he had already seen provided a base from which the others built off of. In an instant, he felt like something had been returned to him that he hadn't realized he was missing.

* * *

_A grassy hill, surrounded by swords and crowned with a sword and a sheath echoed with gentle power, giant gears in the sky becoming more solid._

_But, the forge had not yet activated, it's requirements not yet met._

_The swords, currently mere phantoms in the ground, hummed in anticipation and yearning for their purpose to be fulfilled._

_Thirteen weapons were especially agitated before they calmed down, circling about the hill as they were, as if in a place of honor second to that which was on the hill._

_A weapon was either built with a purpose, or it gained one through its wielder. Without that purpose, they were nothing more than lumps of steel._

_And these weapons were as far from that category as one could get._

_With a soundless sigh, all the weapons seemed to calm._

_None were truly sentient, but with the accumulated power gained after centuries of their legends being told they were not exactly mindless._

_They had waited centuries to have a purpose once more._

_They could wait a few more._

* * *

To the regular people on the battlefield, he was known as the Unknown Soldier. Conflicts would end faster when he was around, and men were spared on both sides.

To the magi, he had gained the reputation as the Wrought Iron Magus. While many wanted to study him, the allies he had gained and the renown he had gathered from taking on Dead Apostles, chimeras, and other monstrosities of the Moonlit World protected him.

To the poor people who couldn't afford help, he was simply known as the Nameless Hero. From fixing a house to cooking meals at a homeless shelter, he would come in, assist for a time, and fade away. Never making a big impact, the people he assisted would never forget him.

The only title that he truly desired was to be known as a Hero of Justice.

He was one who had traveled the world, going from conflict to conflict, in his attempt to save everybody. A foolish venture, one that he acknowledged, but for the chance to reunite with _**her**_ , he would do that and more.

Shaking his head, he growled and shoved it to the side, ignoring all but the most important pieces of info.

Somebody needed help.

And so long as he was able, Shirou would never turn aside when somebody needed to be protected, the memories he just received only confirmed that fact.

With that, he leapt from his hiding spot and charged the batarians.

…

Shirou would admit that a lot of his plans didn't have a lot of actual 'plan' to it.

In his defense, he didn't have a lot of time before potential reinforcements came, and there was no way he would let this girl be taken by them. He couldn't shoot from a distance, else they would immediately take the girl hostage.

But to see a teenager charge them like this? They would probably find it funny, and would hardly take him as a serious threat. Why should they? And so long as he could get in close, he could injure them enough for him to get the girl and get out of there.

Well… Probably. But if he did nothing, then that girl was doomed, which was an unacceptable outcome.

As soon as they saw him, he saw them nudge each other and point towards him, dark amusement in their expressions.

That was alright, let them laugh… Let them underestimate him.

One of them brought up the gun he used on the girl, and Shirou focused on him. Just before he shot, Shirou launched himself to the side, feeling the burn as it passed by his side, and he paid it no mind, already launching himself the rest of the way to group of batarians. None of them were paying attention to the girl anymore, and only one had his weapon out and pointed at him.

Once he got within range, as he did so many times in the past, he Traced his swords into his hands… Only for his eyes to widen as nothing happened, and the batarian's gun slammed into his head.

"Hahahaha! You're going to get a full day's drill for missing that pyjak Sorvan!" Shouted the leader while bending over, laughing. The other batarians weren't much better as they laughed at the scene, and Sorvan growled, two of his eyes twitching dangerously, and he aimed his gun at Shirou's back and pulled the trigger point blank.

Pain. That was all that went through Shirou's mind at that moment, his entire body freezing up from the electricity running through his body.

But the batarian's could not have known.

For Shirou, perhaps more than any magus, understood the concept of 'walking with death'. Early in life, he thought that the correct way to perform magic was to cannibalize his own nerves to create magic circuits. A foolhardy, dangerous, and EXTREMELY PAINFUL method of performing mage craft.

Though foolhardy, it taught Shirou how to work through pain.

Struck with lightning? What was that in comparison to the feeling of pushing red hot iron rods down one's spine?

He wasn't sure why his Tracing failed when it never had before - but now was hardly the time to think about that.

Outnumbered?

Outclassed?

Rare was the time when Shirou wasn't fighting against those stronger than him. Compared to Herakles, these four were nothing!

With the batarian's guard down, Shirou acted. Pushing himself up quickly, he activated his Omni-bow and fired point blank into one of the eyes of the Batarian that shot him. Through the eyes and into the brain, he was dead before he hit the floor.

A surge of guilt went through him before he shut it down. Now wasn't the time for that. Just one more thing to work through when he got them to safety.

Shirou had learned the hard way that sometimes it was necessary to kill in order to save others. But it was never something he took pleasure in, even with scum such as this.

For him, if he had to kill to save somebody, then that just meant he wasn't strong enough yet, or wasn't smart enough to figure out a way around it. He refused to let it drag him down, but instead used it as more motivation to become stronger.

He wasn't a Hero of Justice yet, but one day he would reach it.

For now, he had the battle to worry about. The others hadn't expected the shot, their minds not prepared for this eventuality, so they stopped and gapped where they should have fired.

He estimated he had a few seconds before the others reacted.

Three batarians left, their surprise would not last.

The girl was still on the ground, whimpering in pain. Likely unable to leave on her own accord.

Tracing was not an option.

Shirou quickly checked his magic circuits…

All magic currently not an option. Work out the reason later.

3 seconds before the others reacted.

He glanced at the positions of the batarians and the girl… The girl was closest to him, but all the batarians had guns that looked well used. Dodging with the girl in his arms was impossible. A distraction would be needed.

His eyes spotted something on the batarian's belt.

2 seconds before the others reacted.

His hand lashed out and grabbed the grenade, chucking it into the air.

He couldn't activate it. Most modern grenades (and guns) were ID locked, and he was sure he wasn't on the list.

But it served a purpose. When in a state of surprise, most people reacted in a predictable way to certain things.

If somebody throws an object into the air, the eye naturally tracks it.

1 second before the others reacted.

He quickly raised his bow, his omni-tool quickly flash forging a silicon-carbide arrow, glowing red from just being created. The arrow let loose and collided with the grenade mid-air, just after Shirou shut his eyes closed.

The fragmentation grenade blew up in a flash of light, each batarian yelling in pain as each of their four eyes were exposed, and they lifted their weapons and began firing blindly.

Shirou already had his eyes open, and quickly shot three arrows at the blinded opponents, hissing in pain as one bullet slammed into his arm.

With no armor on… That was probably pretty bad.

His opponents were downed, but unlikely to be dead. Most likely stunned, hopefully too wounded to follow. He didn't have time to check. The explosion would bring others, so he had to hurry.

He dashed over to the girl, who was now staring in shock. Grabbing her with his one good arm, he lifted her up and started dragging her away quickly. "C'mon," he murmured, "Work with me, or they'll get us."

With that, it was like she became invigorated, and began pushing herself as well, so that Shirou didn't have to work as much, and they quickly ducked into an alley, heading towards the closest sewer grate.

It took nearly 10 minutes to reach one of the hideouts that he had made to fend against Kiritsugu. Squeezing in together, Shirou began to dress their wounds, even as he felt his body begin to shut down.

 _A downside of ignoring my wounds till now…_ he thought to himself.

He did his best to push beyond that. The girl he had saved didn't look like she was doing good - after listening to the distant sounds of explosions and screams, she looked like she was a step away from a full blown panic attack.

Reaching out and grabbing her hands, he shook her, "Hey, hey! Take deep breaths, c'mon, breathe with me - In, and out… In, and out..." He said softly, directing her attention to him. As soon as she started following along, he continued, "So what's your name? I don't think I've really seen you around before," It looked like she was a few years younger than him...

A few more deep breaths later she stammered out, "M-my name is T-T-Talitha." Looking like she was about to start crying at any second, Shirou thought quickly and said, "Would you like to hear a story?"

She needed a distraction, something to get her mind off of everything that was happening, so he was trying to keep her off balance, to keep her from thinking about what just happened.

Also, talking would help block out the horrible sounds of battle and the wounded.

She looked confused at the question, but hesitantly gave a nod, so Shirou leaned back as best as he could and pulled her with him into a hug, trying to give her a sense of safety. "Let me tell you a tale of a King then," he said softly, "This one is a favorite of mine, you see. A tale of Earth, of Knights, of Wizards, and a girl that became the greatest King that ever lived…"

His mind was still all jumbled from the influx of memories he had received, but that could wait until he had helped Talitha.

Somehow, his goal of reaching Avalon to reunite with the woman he loved hadn't happened yet, and that fact pained him more than anything else. And yet it looked like he had been given a second chance.

As his actions earlier showed, he still wasn't strong enough to save everybody. The screams and explosions in the distance only emphasized that to him. So he needed to become stronger still.

He needed to be stronger so he could finally see _**her**_ once more.

And with that, he told his tale until Talitha fell asleep, and he wasn't far behind.

It was a couple of days later before the military had been able to drive the batarians away. With as many hostages as the batarians had the Alliance couldn't just shoot the ships out of the sky, and many got away.

Estimated population of Mindoir - 10,000 people.

* * *

_Present Time - year 2183_

The sound of clanking led Lieutenant Bastien to the vehicle bay, and as he walked through the large garage past the variety of military vehicles he stopped at one of the large Mako's, looking at the legs sticking out from underneath and he sighed.

"You know," he said conversationally, "I think you're the only man who actually works while on leave. You really need to go out and spend more time with your harem or something."

A loud thunk was heard from underneath the Mako, and the red headed (and red faced) form of Commander Emiya pulled himself out from the vehicle and glared at him.

"For the last time Bastien," He grumbled, "I do NOT have a harem. Continually insisting on it is not going to make it real."

The Lieutenant raised an eyebrow at him. "Want me to run through the list for you?" He offered.

Emiya gave him a tired look and walked around to the hood of the vehicle and started to tinker with something there, "No, not really."

"Ok, I will. First off is the mystery girlfriend of yours." He started, holding up one finger.

"Correct, and that's the ONLY one." Emiya insisted.

Knowing the identity of the dream lady as being Arturia Pendragon, his beloved King, and the sword to his sheath, had only made him more determined to reunite with her.

After he had regained his memories, he was able to identify the lady that had visited him that day in his dreams and had restored his memories. Though he had never met her personally, he knew her without a shadow of a doubt for the impact that she had on his Saber's life.

Lady Vivian, the Lady of the Lake. Arguably one of the most powerful of the Fae. The greatest of Arturia's benefactors, and quite likely her best friend.

To hear that she approved of him being with Arturia was a balm against his anxious soul, especially after hearing that he would not have been with Arturia without her interference.

That… Hurt.

It hurt far more than he expected.

He wasn't sure why he wouldn't have been able to be with her, but the best explanation that he could think of was that despite his best attempts he had not done enough, had not become a hero in the eyes of the Throne of Heroes, and so was denied entrance to Avalon.

If that was the case, then this second chance made sense, and he would not squander it. This time, he WOULD become a hero. He refused to let Arturia wait longer for him than she had to. Already his soul yearned to be with her once more.

Lieutenant Bastien nodded, his face remaining serious. "Second, there is the hot actress that you keep hanging out with."

Shirou brought his head out of the hood of the Mako and glared at the lieutenant fiercely, "She's my sister!"

The Lieutenant's face didn't change, "Allow me to rephrase that. There is a hot actress that you ARE NOT related to that you keep hanging out with who you keep in contact with alot."

Shirou's eyes narrowed as his glare intensified, "She. Is. My. Sister!" He growled.

Seeing Ilya, alive and well, was one of the happiest moments that he experienced since being back. Even if she was no longer small - the curse of being a homunculus no longer affecting her, and allowing her to live a long and fulfilling life.

Though her reaction to the stunt he pulled all those years ago on Mindoir reminded him that Ilya was still the type of person who had set Berserker on him with a smile on her face. Despite being just a year older than him, she had no problems expressing her… Displeasure at his actions.

Being called 'otouto' instead of 'onii-san' still threw him for a loop every once in a while. A lifetime of being called one versus a lifetime of being called another warring against each other.

He was proud when she became an actress, and he was able to see her popularity soar amongst the various races. She first debuted in a magical girl film, and that had seen amazing success. Now, ten years later, though she had starred in several other roles, she had a soft spot for magical girl films, and loved to take positions in them.

Her latest role casted her as the bad guy, and when he had seen that episode he immediately felt a chill and called her, cautiously asking how she was doing.

She looked so much like the Ilya that had cheerfully asked Berserker to kill him that he had half thought that she regained her memories like he had.

The Lieutenant just gave him an exasperated look and held up a third finger, "Next, you have the Butcher of Torfan."

From the look on Shirou's face, it was clear his annoyance was growing, "Ok, first, Talitha is just a friend, ok? Second, I've told you that that title is just because of the media. She really is a nice girl."

Truly, perhaps the only reason that Shirou hadn't been killed by Ilya for his stunt was because of the girl that was hanging off of him, too afraid to even let him go. From that moment, it was like they had a third member of the family, though Ilya was very disappointed when Talitha wanted to join the military with Shirou instead of being an actress with her.

He was very much aware that Talitha used to have a crush on him, but he liked to think that he was a little more knowledgeable this time around, and was able to head it off by telling her about his girlfriend and how he was taken. She was sad, which made him feel bad, but she still desired to be friends, which he was grateful for. She was probably one of the better friends that he had made, and he always saw her as a very sweet person.

They would have had difficulties supporting another person if it wasn't for the large checks from the government. Apparently, Kiritsugu worked with them in some capacity, though both Shirou and Ilya highly doubted it was for the 'clerk job' that was listed.

Knowing that Kiritsugu died once again hurt a lot, but thanks to his memories from before he was able to work through the grief better so he could be there for Ilya, who did not have that benefit. Having already gone through the grief, he was able to acknowledge how blessed he was to have even more time with his father, and he even had memories of Irisviel now, who he had only been told about before.

The memories he had of the two of them, happy and together, were some that he would treasure forever.

During the funeral, they had been approached by somebody who said he was an associate of Kiritsugu, and he gave his condolences for his death. With the way the man held himself and moved, Shirou was nearly positive that he was an assassin. If this life paralleled with his old one, then that would match up with his old man being an assassin as well. At least it appeared that Kiritsugu kept better company this time around. Thane Krios seemed like a decent man - er, a decent Drell, that is.

Bastien gave him a disbelieving look, "She nearly broke Sergeant Brieve's hand for just touching her!" He stated incredulously.

Shirou stopped for a moment and thought of all of the girls that he knew in life. _Arturia, Rin, Luvia, Ilya, Taiga…_

"Honestly?" Shirou said in a thoughtful tone, "I think that that just shows how nice she is. I mean, she only 'nearly' broke his wrist instead of actually breaking it."

Bastien gaped at him, "Oh c'mon!" He protested, "How is that right?"

Shirou looked at him confused, "Well, she has a right to defend herself against improper touches, doesn't she?"

"But she - no, we're getting off track here," Bastien held up a fourth finger, "The next member of your harem, actually the next dozen or so, is all of those beautiful asari that are after you." He had a look that showed he was both satisfied with his argument and frustrated that it was so, and Shirou groaned at the accusation.

At first opportunity, he had investigated why he was unable to perform mage craft. What he discovered was that he was able, but only in trace amounts.

For some reason, the ambient mana in the air that a magus would draw upon wasn't there. Or if it was, it was not in a form that he was used and could use. Therefore, he had to rely solely on that which his own body generated.

Sadly, that amount didn't allow him to do much. But slowly, as time went on he was getting better. Now he could do Structural Grasping once more, as well as some slight Reinforcement. Most recently, he had been able to do the beginnings of Tracing. Projection was still beyond him, but he could Trace the history of Blades once more. Not anything else, just blades.

It was while he was at Ilium with his squad on leave that he tried Tracing the history of an asari blade. This was something that he was very eager to see if he could do, Tracing a blade made by alien hands.

The asari had an art similar to kendo, with the addition of biotics. When he asked if he could try it, they humored him. They hadn't expected much since he couldn't use any biotics, and honestly neither did he.

Upon picking up the blade, he was shocked at the history within it. It wasn't a serious blade - used simply for the sport, like Kendo would be. But it had HUNDREDS of years of history within it. After thinking about it, he realized it would make sense. Since the asari lived for so long, it made sense that they would strive to make things that lasted as long.

Drawn into the history of the blade, he subconsciously started to mimic the movements within, marveling at how they felt. It wasn't till several minutes later that he realized that the asari were watching him in shocked silence.

Apparently he had managed to perfectly imitate a style that was jealously guarded by one of the families that hadn't taught anybody in over 500 years…

Before he could come up with an explanation, he had been lauded as a genius, and had gained the attention of a LOT of asari sword maidens. Some desired a sparring partner, which he was always willing to give while on leave. Others desired… a different sparring partner.

Shirou sighed in exasperation. "Seriously, I've told you. They're all very nice girls. Well, most of them…" He shuddered, "But I have no desire to be with any of them."

The Lieutenant sighed in exasperation as well, "Yeah yeah yeah, you keep on telling me. Honestly, I'm just waiting for you to come to your senses at this point." He looked curiously at Shirou, "I'm actually a little surprised that you caught on that they wanted to bond with ya," He snickered. "When I first met you I had you pegged as one of those oblivious types."

Shirou's face flushed in embarrassment, "Matriarch Edoara took me aside and… explained everything to me." he muttered.

Ok, so maybe he was still rather oblivious to not realizing that so many asari desired him… But in his defense, he didn't know them very well, and vice versa, so he didn't think that he would have much appeal to them, especially once he told them he had a girlfriend.

Then Matriarch Edoara took him aside and gave him an in depth explanation as to what the asari saw.

Performing an old sword style had gained him the attention and initial desire, but that was far from the end of it.

In Asari culture, finding true love was a huge deal. Finding a bond mate - a soul mate - that completed them, was heavily prevalent in asari media, and had been for many many years.

When Asari maidens looked at him, they saw a lonely, dedicated, and kind soldier that had been through several tragedies in his past, with Mindoir and later with Akuze. When he first told them that he had a girlfriend, many of them had respected that and backed off… until it was let loose that apparently this girlfriend had died on Mindoir (a popular theory amongst the men, since Shirou had supposedly not had any contact with her since he joined the military).

Then, to them, he had turned into a lonely, dedicated, kind, and _heartbroken_ soldier who was unwilling to let love into his life once more.

It was practically the plot from a movie, and many of the asari that he knew wanted to be the one to help 'heal his heart'.

It was actually rather touching… if it hadn't been directed at him.

He was especially irritated with whoever it was that had spread the word that his 'girlfriend' had died on Mindoir… so far, he hadn't had any luck in finding out who it was.

* * *

At a board meeting on Arcturus Station, Admiral Myrddin sneezed violently, causing a few people to look at him in alarm.

Seeing this, the Admiral smiled brightly and waved off their concern, "No worries everyone, I'm sure that that was just somebody talking about how amazing I am."

* * *

Thankfully, most of the asari understood the concept of 'no' and didn't push the issue. Though he was suspicious that many of them hadn't given up and were just hoping that he would choose them if they remained close by and friendly with him.

That was actually the main reason he was in the vehicle bay while on leave. While he was always willing to hang out with friends, the amount of people that wanted to hang out with him made him uncomfortable, and every once in a while he enjoyed just being by himself, losing himself while working on the insides of the vehicles.

Well, at least until an annoying Lieutenant found him and started making baseless accusations.

Said Lieutenant looked very much unconvinced with Shirou's words. "I don't understand what your issue is man. You're surrounded by all these beautiful ladies, and you don't do anything about it! Play your cards right and you could totally have them eating out of your hand." He grinned and gave Shirou a wink, "maybe all at the same time even, eh?"

Shirou just gave him a tired look and slammed the hood down on the Mako, "You know Bastien, I think I managed to figure out why you haven't had a date in the last 5 years."

"Hey!" Bastien protested, "No need to go there man."

Shirou rolled his eyes at him, "Even if that was possible - which it ISN'T," he insisted, "I would have no desire to have a harem. I only want one girl, and I consider myself the luckiest man in the world that she would even consider me worthy of her."

Bastien gave a snort, "Yeah, sure sure. Your imaginary girlfriend is totally better than the multiple non-imaginary hotties that you could totes have."

Shirou glanced at him with a raised brow, "You know, I was planning on cooking a big meal tonight before I head off to my new post on the Normandy," he said casually. "That's totally voluntary. I might decide to go out and do something instead."

Immediately, the Lieutenant was in front of Shirou with his hat in his hands and panic in his eyes, "H-hey man, you know I'm just joking about all that stuff, right?" He laughed nervously, "I'm always real supportive of you and your soulmate getting together. The thought brings tears to my eyes and all, you know? It's super romantic and all."

Shirou looked at him in amusement and gave a huff, "Relax, I've already bought the ingredients for it. I might as well get started on it now - I don't think I'll get any more work done down here."

And with that, Shirou started on his way to the galley, his thoughts drawn involuntarily to Arturia once more from the conversation.

He missed her. He was working hard to make sure that he got it right this time. But without knowing how he failed last time, how was he to know for sure? He had faith that Arturia would wait for him, but what if he didn't make it? How long would she wait, without knowing where he was?

Shirou pushed those thoughts from his head as best as possible. Worrying about that sort of thing wouldn't do any good. The best he could do right now was push on as best as he can.

He had done what Kiritsugu had hoped for, and had become one of the best soldiers that the Alliance had to offer, and was now in the best position to help people in need. Was it enough? He wasn't sure, but he would continue fighting for that chance.

Besides him, Lieutenant Bastien was trying to figure out if he could get away with disabling the "Commander Proximity Sensor" they installed at the oven in the galley... It had taken a bit, but he and the other men had been able to make something that would let them know if the Commander's Omni-tool was in the galley. Sure, the other guys would be pissed at him if he did it, but this was the Commander's last meal they were talking about!

Some things in life were worth fighting for after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, the truth is that I dislike sad stories… Since Kiritsugu and Irisviel had to die, I decided to save Talitha. I know that stories should have ups and downs, sad moments and happy moments, so I'll try to incorporate the sad. There will most likely be far more happy moments.   
> As for why they had to die? Well, when I first thought of the concept of this story, I wanted both Arturia and Shirou to start out with the potential origin stories of Shepherd. True, I could have tweaked it fairly easily. But, like I said, a story should have down's to make the up's all the more important.   
> I had a few people that were curious why I was planning on having Shirou be an Engineer. There were several reasons for such a thing. The first is that Shirou was well known as a fixer upper, using Structural Grasping to understand machines better, and Reinforcement to help fix them, so that skill set said Engineer to me. Another important reason was the class Talon Mercenary Engineer - They are the only class that uses Omni-bows. That alone would have made me want to make him an engineer. And lastly, I thought it would be nice to have Shirou and Arturia's abilities compliment each other. One using biotics, the other using tech.   
> Some of you may note that Shirou's chapter is a lot longer than Arturia's… That does not mean that Shirou is going to be a larger part of the story. I am going to try to make it 50/50 for them. Shirou's backstory however was at Mindoir, which meant that more was going to be happening for him than Arturia. That, and I felt the need to expand more with what happened with Ilya and Kiritsugu.   
> Also, nobody has asked for a harem, but I wanted to make sure that it was clear that this is an Arturia x Shirou story, and will not become a harem.  
> Hopefully all of you enjoyed that. I actually think that this one turned out pretty well :) Once more, I thank my sister, CaptainDarkElf, who beta read this story for me, and I thank all of the people who favorited or left a review for this story. It means a lot to me, and tells me that I'm doing alright.   
> See you next chapter!


	4. A Reunion Long Awaited

_Shirou's POV_

Shirou slowly walked along the riverside, relaxing as he listened to the sound of flowing water and rustling trees. Scattered around the area were patches of flowers of several varieties. That, along with the light breeze, creating an illusion of tranquility that settled around the area.

If not for the lack of animals, he would have thought that he was on Earth, or a similar planet, instead of Arcturus Station.

While he had been on the station before, he was still left in a state of awe that humanity had managed to create a structure capable of not only sustaining life in space, but for an entire city to be able to _thrive_ in it.

 _In a way, this is probably as close to a Reality Marble that one could get without mage craft_ he thought in amusement as he walked along the grassy shore of the waterway, looking up at the light shining down from mirrors far above. _Humanity imposing its own reality on the reality of space._

While not as large as the Citadel, it was still an impressive 5 kilometers in diameter, containing an entire city within. Neighborhoods, stores, farms, parks... Far more than just a space station, Arcturus Station could be considered the heart of the Alliance, with both the government and the military calling the place headquarters.

He had arrived at the station earlier that day, with his stuff being directly transported to the Normandy, and he had decided to take a walk through the residential district.

He had thought about going to check out the Normandy but had been feeling antsy for some reason, many of the swords within his inner world feeling as if they were shivering in anticipation. Unfortunately he couldn't figure out the reason for that, and had hoped that taking a walk would help him to relax.

It hadn't worked as well as he had hoped, but it was better than nothing.

He spent most of the morning like that, simply walking through the artificially created nature, not really paying attention to time, before finally moving away from the shore and towards the shuttle.

It was while he was waiting near the back of a crowd to get on the rail when he smelled something that caused his eyes to widen as his heart clenched.

_The scent of lilies and daisies, freshly bloomed across an open field of grass, and undertones of honeysuckle._

Thaumaturgy wasn't something that could be sensed through normal means, but most mages could detect it through one way or another. For some, it was a feeling they got, like someone drawing a finger up their spine. Others might see it in tints of colors across their sight.

He had found that he had the capability of detecting magic through scent. It wasn't until Rin had likened him to a bloodhound that he realized how sensitive he was to magic in comparison to others.

When he had first met Rider, despite her beauty he could smell the thick stench of blood around her. Her Bloodfort Andromeda, oddly enough, smelled of sweets.

Each source of magic had its own scent.

In all of the years since he had regained his memories on Mindoir he had not smelled any magic, to the point that he wondered if mages still existed in this future. And, in all honesty, they might not - the Magus population was definitely lower years before when he was first alive than it had been during Arturia's time, perhaps the decline continued?

But now, for the first time in his new life, his nose twitched at the faint scent that was not truly a scent, and his head darted back and forth frantically, looking through the crowds to find the source.

While Arcturus Station contained many plants and some animals from Earth, it was a simple fact that it was not Earth. For a magus, this meant that they would find that it lacked a distinct something that could only be found on the World.

_The life force of the planet - that which permeates throughout the natural world. A source of power._

This particular scent was faint, and yet it was enough to gain his immediate attention.

After all, how could it not?

Finding somebody that had magic would have been surprising enough, and worth investigation. But this scent was one that he had encountered in the past.

_A woman with captivating emerald eyes, her usually impassive face softening to show a rare side of herself that only he was blessed enough to witness._

In all his travels, of all the creatures and people he met, he had only met one person that had a scent like this.

' _Your fate is my fate, and my fate is yours'_

It took him a few precious seconds of searching, but he then found the source at the front of the group, just entering the shuttle.

It wasn't a very clear look, just the back of her head and bit of her face really. But the golden color of her hair, her stance as she got onto the shuttle and waited, the aura she unconsciously emanated…

Shirou burst forward, ignoring the cries of surprise from the crowd and their complaints as he pushed them aside. He'd feel bad about it later he was sure, but for now his only thought was to get to the woman with that scent.

Unfortunately the shuttle had other ideas, and it closed just as he reached the doors. Other people looked at him oddly as his fist hit the window of the car, and yet the woman didn't turn around, seemingly distracted by something.

Shirou watched in frustration as the vehicle left, mind racing as he quickly accessed his omnitool for a map of the station and the locations for where the shuttle stopped. It took him only a few seconds to map out a route, and he took off running, ignoring the stares that he was receiving.

_A foolish man, always pursuing an ideal that could never be achieved, in order to reach an unattainable goal._

As he ran through the streets and past residences he debated with himself for a moment before deciding that the need was great enough, and the image of a gun appeared in his head, hammer cocked.

Though used sparingly the last decade the mental trigger still came naturally to him when needed, and the hammer slammed into place.

Circuit-like patterns formed over his legs, unseen but for a glow underneath his clothes, and his magic circuits thrummed from within, devouring his dwindling reserves. Well trained muscles and magic worked together, reinforced, allowing him to push himself much farther than before.

His newfound speed definitely drew eyes, but he simply did not have the energy to push himself to unbelievable speeds, and not for the first time he cursed his lack of energy.

His reserves had always been low, and it was thanks to the fact that he specialized in areas of magecraft that required little prana compared to other potential branches that he accomplished as much as he did.

Magic circuits were nodes of the spirit that aligned with the body. Their purpose was to convert the ambient mana in the air into usable energy for the magi's magecraft. However, ever since he regained his memories he had had to be even more conservative with his energy, using only trace amounts, for the environment contained almost no magic to replenish his own supply with.

It wasn't too surprising, despite how frustrating it was. Mana was energy produced by the World, so why would he expect it to be present outside of the World?

Spells, normally low enough maintenance for him not to worry that much, became challenging to cast. Outside the boundaries of the World he found it more difficult to use his own magecraft, his reserves renewing at a snail's pace with nothing but himself to refill it with.

Thus, he needed to be careful and only use it when needed.

But this? This was important enough.

He was a fool, a fact he would readily admit. He ran through the streets and past citizens with little regard for how he looked, and he knew that Rin would call his actions idiotic.

Arturia was waiting in Avalon - this was something he knew, and had known, for years. For that reason it was impossible for her to be here like he was.

_For two to meet, one needed to wait endlessly while the other pursued unceasingly._

Logically he knew that it was most likely somebody that simply looked like Saber. He had met a few people that were similar, and according to Arturia the Caster of the Fourth War had believed that she was Jeanne D'Arc.

…

But none of those people had ever given off HER 'scent' before, and the only place he had found that smelled remotely similar to her was an ancient forest in Great Britain.

It took only a few more minutes for him to make it to the next shuttle stop, and he burst inside just in time to see the car leave once more. Cursing to himself, he once more looked to his Omni-tool.

"Excuse me sir, can I help yo-"

Giving a quick shake of his head and a muttered apology to the person, he dashed off once more, running to the next shuttle station.

Was it impossible for her to be here?

Perhaps.

And yet, would he not once have considered it impossible for him to be here as well?

_Both experiencing a life full of loss, yet determined to sacrifice that which they had to all but themselves._

He had survived the cursed fire when all others died around him.

He had survived the 5th Holy Grail War, ill prepared and weak as he was, while those who had prepared for years died.

He had fallen in love with, and gained the love of, one who was born more than a thousand years before.

His life was full of impossibilities, so what was one more?

He started feeling the effects of prana exhaustion and reluctantly slowed down, stopping his Reinforcement. Looking around the street, he located a skycab and quickly dashed inside, throwing the destination into the automated system and forced himself to lean back as the skycab started flying.

While it's speed was decent, it was still slower than the shuttle, and Shirou found himself debating whether he could get away with hacking the vehicle to increase its speed before deciding against it. While he was confident he could do so, if it was caught by the traffic VI then it could remotely shut down the vehicle.

His N7 status could get him out of most trouble, but a stopped car right now was unacceptable.

So he forced himself to lean back and wait as he looked out the window, his mind still reeling from the possibility and hope.

He could be wrong, this he would freely admit it. In fact, odds were good that he was overreacting, and the person he saw was somebody that looked like Saber. He was far from perfect, and had made his own fair share of mistakes in life.

But how could he not take a chance?

If this was a mistake, then it would simply be an embarrassing encounter that he'd have to apologize for. But if it _**was**_ Arturia…

Unless he gave chase, he would never know.

Eventually the cab made it to the shuttle station, and he jumped out and made his way over, only to pause before entering as he smelled her scent once more, leading away from the station and quickly fading.

Looking around once more, he saw the blonde haired woman on an escalator leading upwards, and he quickly ran towards her again, letting his magic circuits activate once more to give him a boost…

Only to feel a wave of exhaustion hit him, causing him to stumble and trip, hitting the ground hard, barely getting his arms up and avoiding hitting his face.

He quickly deactivated his magic circuits and didn't move for a moment, trying to deal with the dizziness he felt. While magical exhaustion was something that he had had to deal with before with the lack of ambient magic, it was never pleasant. This wasn't as bad as it was after Akuze, and his reserves weren't empty yet ,but using magic in conjunction with exercise probably wasn't a good idea right now.

"Hey, you alright man?"

Shirou turned his head to see a man wearing an Alliance cap and sporting a short beard with brown hair looking down on him in concern. The man gestured to some crutches that he was using, "I gotta say, that was an impressive fall. And when the cripple is the one saying that, you know you have a problem."

Legs trembling, Shirou gingerly stood up, doing his best to ignore the vertigo that assaulted him, and gave a small smile at the man, "Sorry about that," He said distractedly, "I'm just, eh..." He glanced at the escalators and sighed in frustration upon seeing that the woman was gone, "I'm just having one of those days I guess." He finished in frustration.

This wasn't the end of it. The woman looked like she was wearing a uniform, which meant that he could use his N7 status to find her. If she wasn't his Saber… Well, then he'd figure out some way to apologize for the breach in privacy.

To pursue endlessly was his charge, one that he would never cease. Whether to Avalon or someplace else, it mattered not. The how's and the why's could be answered later.

He'd see what he could find out once he got to the Normandy. If he was lucky, he'd be able to find a lead before they left the station.

* * *

_Arturia's POV_

Arturia stood in the docking bay, other people walking around her as she ignored them in favor of viewing one of the starships before her.

It was obviously newly constructed, with none of the inevitable wear and tear that would come from traveling at FTL. The design itself was sleek and elegant, but Arturia had been on enough warships to tell that this was highly advanced. The dual thrusters on each side were massive for a frigate of its size, which she knew would grant it greater speed and maneuverability than any other ship of its size. The plating and the style with which they had been laid out, the GARDIAN laser turrets, the missile ports, all were a testament to the ship's combat capabilities.

On the side of the ship the name was proclaimed as the "Normandy".

Instead of admiring the advanced ship like many around her did, she couldn't help but feel nervous as she stared at the ship where she was to begin her newest assignment.

Along with a Commander Shirou Emiya.

Her breath hitched, and without realizing it her hands clenched into fists, causing a few passerby's to look at her in confusion.

After she had heard the name from Tessa, she had gone back to her room and immediately started looking up information on the extranet on Commander Emiya.

Upon seeing a picture of him she had felt her heart beat painfully in her chest as her eyesight blurred. The person in the picture was clearly older and more mature than what her memories remembered, but the red hair, his amber eyes, his gentle smile…

She knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that this was her Sheath.

Looking further only confirmed her suspicions. His parents were Kiritsugu Emiya and Iriesviel von Einzbern, both who were now deceased, and he had a sister by the name of Ilya von Einzbern. While she felt true sorrow that Iriesviel had perished, she did not feel near as much at Kiritsugu's passing.

Perhaps he was better in this life, but her memories of him were forever tainted from his actions during the Fourth Grail War.

Despite her own feelings, she could feel sorrow that Shirou and Ilya had to feel the pain of losing their parents once again, as well as guilt that she was able to still be with her brother Kay and her father, Ector.

Moving on from the massacre of Mindoir, she looked up what she could on where he had been, feeling her hands clench in fear when she saw the mission report for Akuze, followed by feeling pride when she saw when he had been awarded the position of N7.

She also noted with some amusement at the numerous reports of insubordination that he had on record. Apparently, her Sheath had a reputation for disregarding orders when it came to saving other people. The only reason why he hadn't been reprimanded more was that his stunts often actually worked, though he certainly hadn't won any favors with many of his commanding officers. They seemed to either love him or hate him.

How had she missed this?

True, she was never one to gossip with others, not including what Tessa insisted on informing her about, but surely she would have heard about him at some point!

She had heard about the disaster of Akuze, and how it was only through the actions of the team leader that the entire squad hadn't been slaughtered, but she had never heard the team leader's name. She had merely been grateful that the group's lives had been spared.

That she hadn't seen him in any of his other assignments or positions wasn't too surprising - the military was vast and spread out after all. But she should have heard of him once he became an N7. When they weren't on assignment, the military liked to 'show them off'.

The N7 were the elite of the military, they were featured in the media as heroes, and there was hardly anybody within the Alliance that didn't know of them. She herself had to suffer through many parties and the like with various leaders, able to bear through it only because she understood the importance of upholding that image.

She didn't really socialize with the other N7's, and had not really found any that she would count as a friend, but she knew of most of them because of these gatherings. And she could say without a shadow of a doubt that Shirou had never been to any of the ones that she had to go to.

However, looking at pictures of gatherings that she hadn't gone to when she was on assignment, she could see him within them.

Time and time again, it was as if some force had been keeping her unaware that her beloved had been around and was extremely close to her.

But now she was aware of him... And they had been assigned to work together...

While this had originally filled her with happiness, now that her mind had had time to think it over, she couldn't help but feel worried.

Looking up at the beautiful ship before her, the anxiety rolled through her stomach as she thought of her greatest fear - What if he didn't remember her?

As much as she wanted to deny the possibility, she couldn't get rid of the thought. After all, Ector and Kay, two of the people she was closest too, did not remember their past life. What if Shirou, her sheath, and the one that she gave her heart to, did not remember her?

Fate had already shown itself to be cruel, what was to prevent it from giving her the one she loved, but without his memories of her?

She had to consciously push down the fear, eyes closing temporarily to clear her mind as best as she could.

She would make it through it if it came to it. She was not some useless maiden that needed a man by her side to function. For years she had pushed away her own emotions as she worked to protect her country, and she could do so again if needed to protect those unable to protect themselves.

… But it would hurt.

To have him look at her as if she was a stranger? As simply another coworker? How could it not hurt?

And if he didn't remember her, didn't that mean that he might already be with somebody?

A flash of rage went through her at the thought, and she groaned as she worked once more to push the emotions down again, trying to remind herself that he would never consciously do so.

Not to her.

She took several deep breaths and forced herself out of her depressing thoughts. None of that mattered right now, and it was useless to spend too much time thinking about unknowns.

Maybe he remembered, or maybe he didn't. She certainly wouldn't find out by worrying about it.

Hesitation was the enemy, and she was ever one to face her problems head on.

With that she squared her shoulders and started walking towards the Normandy, the people around her parting before her and the commanding aura she wielded.

* * *

Walking through the airlock, Arturia gazed about curiously, taking in the gleaming decks and the dozen or so haptic interfaces for crewmembers. Farther down, she could see the glow of the CIC and the galaxy map, recalling what she had been told about the Normandy containing some Turian features.

Walking towards the CIC, she was planning on finding a place where she could sit and wait with a good view of the airlock when she heard a familiar voice.

"Well well, if it isn't the first of my problem patients."

Arturia couldn't help the grin that came over her face and turned to face the speaker. "Doctor Chakwas," She greeted fondly, and she walked over to the older woman, "I wasn't aware that you were assigned to the Normandy."

Standing slightly shorter than Arturia, Doctor Karin Chakwas had short, dignified gray hair with green eyes. While she wasn't sure as to Chakwas's true age, she carried herself with authority and experience that Arturia respected.

Dr. Chakwas looked at her sternly, but her eyes betrayed a fondness in them, "Well, I think that they noticed that I had experience in treating a few of the stubborn soldiers that would be on this ship, and didn't want to traumatize any other doctor by assigning them here."

Arturia felt her cheeks burn slightly and she coughed lightly in embarrassment, "I'm hardly that bad!" She protested weakly, only to turn away when the doctor raised an eyebrow at her.

Personally, Arturia blamed most of her reputation on her Magic Core.

Where a magus had Magic Circuits, which converted mana into an energy that they were able to use, there were creatures known as Phantasmal Beasts which were distinctly different for having what was known as a Magic Core. Instead of simple conversion, a Magic Core would _create_ magical energy for the Phantasmal Beast to use.

When she was young, Merlin had implanted within her the Magic Core of a _Dragon,_ a creature well regarded as the pinnacle of Phantasmal Beasts, their magic core capable of generating magical energy by the Dragon merely breathing.

At least, that was what it was supposed to do. Unfortunately, ever since she had regained her memories she had been unable to awaken her core. She could feel it, and even inactive as it was it generated a small amount of energy, yet she could not figure out how to reactivate it.

 _Perhaps there is some truth to the legends that told of dragons hibernating for years without waking up_ she thought wryly.

Arturia had first become acquainted with Dr. Chakwas years ago, when she was first training in her biotic abilities. After being unable to awaken her dragon core, she had thrown herself into her biotic training in order to compensate for the lack of her core.

In particular, her trainer had shown her a video of some asari commando's doing a move that had been dubbed "Biotic Charge". It had reminded her so much of her own "Mana Burst" that she was determined to learn it, despite others criticizing her.

It wasn't about pride, but about practicality. She had an entire life of training at her disposal, of moves and tactics that she had learned to employ, and many of them were centered around her Mana Burst. If another move could replicate it, then she would not have to learn a, potentially, inferior style.

The main problem with her decision was the very nature of biotic charge. Biotics was the power to manipulate mass effect fields to various effects. Manipulation of gravity to either create a shield around oneself or to lift objects or creatures. To increase the mass of an object. To rip apart a target from the molecular level.

Those were all skills that a potential biotic could learn. Biotic Charge, though, required a combination of abilities in order to successfully implement.

One needed to manipulate the fields around themself to various effects, in a move that combined the properties of both "Lift" and "Throw", with several key differences. During the actual charge, the user needed to control the fields around the target to negate their mass, which helped reduce the pressure placed on their own body upon impact.

It was the strain of keeping the various mass fields up and running that made the move difficult. That, and the concentration needed to maintain the fields while performing the charge. The level of precision and control needed to use those fields around a non-enemy was considerable, and multitasking on that level often led to harming oneself.

People called Arturia a prodigy, but she felt the title undeserved. When it came to combat, she had the experience of a lifetime at war to draw upon after all. And when it came to biotics? Nobody realized the many hours upon hours she spent trying to perfect those moves, nor the many trips to the infirmary that was required until she got it down.

It was there that she was first introduced to Dr. Chakwas.

Not the best of first meetings, she would admit...

Dr. Chakwas had been stationed there at the time, and was always the person to treat/berate the girl for wounding herself so often during her training. Arturia had injured herself often enough in her training that they got to know each other very well.

They later worked with each other during the Skyllian Blitz, where Dr. Chakwas had assisted with the defense and helped keep everybody standing. Arturia had been a frequent visitor to the clinic.

Arturia pouted inwardly. In her defence, Avalon would normally have healed her wounds, and that had caused her to be somewhat reckless in her past life. If she could take a hit that would normally kill one of her knights, then why shouldn't she do so? They had been HER knights, and they had pledged themselves to her, so therefore it was her duty to protect them.

She wasn't nearly as bad as she had been then - she was well aware that Avalon no longer protected her - but she would reluctantly admit that she ended up in the infirmary more often than most soldiers.

Dr. Chakwas hummed and looked at her skeptically, but eventually broke into a soft smile, "Well, regardless, it is good to see you one again Commander," she said, and then sighed, "And you're hardly the only problem patient I'm anticipating I suppose."

Arturia looked at her in curiosity, but before she could inquire further, another voice interrupted them, "Don't worry Commander," The voice said warmly, and she turned to see Captain Anderson smiling and walking towards them, "I think she's more referring to me than she is you."

She smiled back at him and walked towards him, giving him a salute, only to huff in amusement when he ignored it in favor of pulling her in for a quick hug.

"Please," he said as he broke away from the hug, "I'm not your commanding officer yet, and my honorary niece deserves more than just a salute from me."

She gave him an arch look, already resigned to his actions. Her father and Anderson had been old war buddies from the First Contact War, and had remained close over the years. Their 'Uncle' Anderson was a frequent visitor, and she and Kay were very familiar with him at this point.

Chakwas raised an eyebrow at him. "While I will agree that you've had too many visits to the infirmary yourself over the years, I do hope that you're not planning on taking to the field yourself sir." She said blandly, but with an undertone of warning, to which Anderson just chuckled at and waved the accusation away.

"You can relax, I'm not planning on it. But considering the capabilities of the Normandy and the types of missions we might be sent on, it's probably premature to say that I won't be seeing any action myself." Anderson stated, and Arturia couldn't help but feel amused. It was faint, but she heard a bit of hope in Anderson's voice.

Once a soldier, always a soldier she supposed.

Her attention was grabbed by Anderson as he gestured to another room.

"We have quite a while before everybody else is due to arrive, would the two of you like a tour of the Normandy?" He asked, the pride evident in his voice.

Chakwas readily agreed, but Arturia hesitated as she glanced towards the airlock. She was hoping to wait until Shirou had arrived so she could talk to him immediately and figure out if he remembered anything…

She eventually decided to go with Anderson for now. It was a small ship, and Shirou WOULD be here soon, so she could wait a bit longer.

* * *

_Shirou's POV_

_A couple hours later_

"You know, you don't have to watch over me anymore, I really do feel better."

"Well, yeah, but I want to extend this moment for as long as I can. It's a unique feeling for me, being more physically able than another person. Oh, and you're still super pale by the way."

Shirou and the man with crutches made their way onto the Normandy, both moving with care. Shirou because he was still feeling the effects of using too much magic, and the other, Flight Lieutenant Jeff 'Joker' Moreau, for having 'Vrolik syndrome', a condition he was born with that caused his bones to become brittle.

"It's… my natural complexion," Shirou replied dismissively while scratching the back of his head uncomfortably.

Let it be known that Shirou never learned to become a good liar, in either his past life or current.

Joker looked at him skeptically, "Yeah, I totally believe that," He stated sarcastically, "And is collapsing randomly also natural for you? If so, then I gotta question your natural state. I think it needs help"

Shirou just shrugged helplessly as they made their way through the airlock of the Normandy, and was grateful when Joker changed the topic as they got to the front of the bridge and he gestured to the area grandly, "Well, what do you think of my new love?" He asked eagerly as he sat down in the pilot's chair, giving a small sigh of satisfaction as he did so.

Looking around, Shirou had to admit that it was very impressive, the instruments and displays easily surpassing the quality of most ships that he had been on. "Not bad," He admitted with a smile. "So this is the 'love' that you risked going to jail for?"

Joker gave an innocent shrug, "Hey, sometimes something happens and you just know that she's the one for you, you know?" He asked with a smirk, to which Shirou couldn't help but chuckle at, thinking about how Joker didn't realize how true those words were.

"Besides," he continued, "I knew that the only way that I was going to fly something like this was by, well, _borrowing_ it." He huffed in irritation, "I'm the best pilot in the Alliance, I graduated at the top of my class and they had me piloting shuttles for crying out loud!" He exclaimed angrily, and Shirou couldn't help but sympathize with Joker. He knew what it was like to have a dream, and having the willingness to do whatever was needed to accomplish it.

Joker then glanced at Shirou, his smirk returning, "And it appears that fate agrees with me, cause here I am." He said as he gestured to everything in front of him. "Trust me, I was made to fly this ship Commander, and if anybody doubts that? Then I guess I'm just going to have to prove them wrong with how awesome I am."

Shirou carefully put a hand on Joker's shoulder, "No need to do anything extravagant," He said with a smile, "If you were chosen to pilot the Normandy, I think that that proves right there that you're one of the best."

Joker rolled his eyes, but Shirou could detect a hint of gratefulness in them, "Hey, you're preaching to the choir man, I already know what I am," He bragged, "Anyways, can you find your way to your bunk by yourself? Or do you need me to hold your hand for that as well? I mean, not that I'll hold your hand, but I'm told I give great moral support."

Shirou chuckled, "I think I can manage on my own," He said wryly, "Though I should probably report to Captain Anderson first." _And then I need to start searching the records to see if I can find that person..._

Joker started to say something, but Shirou missed it as all of a sudden a scent washed over him, causing him to stiffen in surprise, and he couldn't help but get lost in it for a moment.

"Commander Emiya?" A voice, _HER_ voice, asked behind him, and he slowly turned around, almost disbelievingly.

She was taller, he noted absently. Her features were more defined, more mature. Far from detracting from her looks it added to it, giving her a more regal aura. Everything else about her - her deep green eyes, her hair… It was exactly as it was before.

The Sword to his Sheath was here, standing before him in all her beauty.

 _Well,_ he thought, his mind in a daze, _that was faster than I expected._

* * *

_Arturia's POV_

Arturia had once been accused of being a king with no emotions. An accusation made by one of her Knights, one whom she had considered her friend. Though it hurt at the time, she forced herself to employ that perfect mask once more as she looked at 'Commander Emiya'.

She had thought herself somewhat prepared. She had finished the tour with Anderson and Chakwas, and had then waited in the CIC, forcing herself to chat with the various crew members as they came on board. In that time she had managed to get her emotions under control and felt ready to confront Shirou no matter the end result.

Now that she was looking at him though, she realized that she was wrong. She watched as he turned around to face her, her pools of emerald green met his liquid amber eyes and she felt like a dam was about to burst in her chest, that look managing to undermine all of her defenses.

_He was here. Her beloved was finally in front of her once more!_

It took every bit of willpower that she possessed to keep her composure. She wanted badly to question him, to demand how much he knew… Or to hug him while crying tears of joy.

At this point, she wasn't sure which desire was winning out.

_How long had she waited for this moment?_

So many years of waiting for him in Avalon, followed by a decade since she had regained her memories here.

Unfortunately, she couldn't do any of the things that she wanted. Not with others around. She had to hold herself together for just a few moments longer.

Shirou had not yet answered her, instead looking like he was in a state of shock. And was that hope in his eyes? Or was she projecting her own emotions onto him? It gave her own hope a boost that maybe he did indeed remember her, but she didn't dare assume yet, couldn't allow her hopes to get too high.

Well, higher than they were...

The pilot that was sitting down looked over at Shirou and elbowed him, "Yep! This is Commander Emiya alright. Don't mind him, this is just his 'natural state'," The man said in a serious tone, which seemed to jolt Shirou out of his shock.

She couldn't stand waiting much longer - she had already waited too long for this moment. "I'd like to speak with you for a moment. Please follow me." Turning around briskly and quickly moving away, she heard the pilot behind her whisper "Dang man, barely on board and already in trouble."

Oh how wrong he was.

After only a moment she heard footsteps behind her, and she continued moving down the hallway and past the CIC to the Communications Room. There would be no reason for anybody to be there right now, so it should be enough to grant them a few moments of privacy. Just in case though, she surreptitiously sent a command to lock the door after the door closed.

Walking into the middle of the circular room, she once more looked at the redhead that was her sheath, who was looking like he was struggling to think of something to say himself.

There might have been a better way of handling this conversation. There was still the possibility that he might not remember, or he might be different than before.

She was well trained in the arts of diplomacy - As a king, she was used to talking to nobles and knights, to enemy commanders and other royalty. As a soldier and N7 she had grown accustomed to talking to marines under her, as well as to her superiors, politicians, and the press.

She had experience talking to others in the capacity of knight, king, and soldier. But never as a woman. That role was one that she filled only for one person, and she had precious little experience in doing that.

But despite her inexperience, she was determined to forge ahead. She had waited, and now that he was here her waiting was over. She desperately wanted that which was hers, and now that she could act, how could she do otherwise?

So she dropped her mask and let her emotions show as she had only ever willingly done for him, the hope and the fear shining through. "Shirou?" She asked quietly, looking into his amber eyes, "Is this you?" Opening herself up, becoming vulnerable.

She saw him stiffen once more at her words, his eyes widening, the apprehension within them going away. "... Saber?" His tone filled with hope.

That one word was enough to dash all of her fears, and her heart began to beat faster as her heart was filled with joy.

This… This was definitely her beloved, and he remembered her! She felt as tears flow down her cheeks as the stress and worry that had been piling up disappeared, leaving her lightheaded.

She wasted no time as she launched herself at him, throwing her arms around his body and rested her head in the crook of his neck. After a moment, she felt his own arms wrap tightly around her as well and she reveled in the feeling.

There were still things to figure out of course. How was this possible? Why did it occur? She wasn't foolish enough to think that this was without strings attached. But right now, she'd be damned if she let anything intrude upon this moment.

She heard him breath in shakily before murmuring in her ear, "I… I'm awake, right? This really is happening?" Another shaky breath, "I'm not going to wake up and find you gone again, am I?"

She hugged him tighter, and she knew that his uniform was getting soaked with her tears, "No," She whispered back, tightening her arms around him, "We're together. And you're not getting away from me."

He chuckled at that, parting from her so that he could gaze into her eyes once more, and she could see the adoration and love in them as he stroked her cheek.

"So long as you'll have me I'll never part from you." He said with conviction, before capturing Arturia's lips in a passionate kiss that had her heart racing, and she felt a burst of happiness within her as she returned it as best as she could.

It was clumsy, with both sides having little experience with kissing, but she didn't care about that. To her, it was perfect, and she refused to let it stop now.

This might not be Avalon, the place they had promised to meet at, but right now this was their Utopia.

And there was nowhere that they would rather be.

* * *

_Unnoticed by all, in one dreamscape a dragon huffed satisfactorily in it's sleep, it's treasure returned to it once more. In another, transparent swords vibrated at the thought of a purpose fulfilled while giant gears shimmered into view once more, embers beginning to simmer in the forge._

_Two different realities, separate and distinct, yet connected by a lonely hill that was crowned with a sword and a sheath._

_Two souls, forever bound by the strands of fate, forged into unbreakable chains with trust and love._

* * *

_Anderson's POV_

Captain Anderson quietly closed the door to the Communications Room, his mind slightly in shock.

He had seen both of the Commanders make their way to this room, and he had wanted to introduce them to the Spectre that would be accompanying them on this mission, the Turian Nihlus Kryik.

Though it was obvious that Arturia had locked the door, he figured that she simply wanted to introduce herself to her fellow commander and have them get to know each other since they would be working together in the near future.

Only to open the door and realize that, apparently, they already, eh, knew each other.

Now, he by no means a stranger to the idea of two people getting together, either short or long term. His thoughts went to his own marriage and eventual divorce with his wife Cynthia, who had been unable to handle him being away for extended periods of time, followed by what might have been with Kahlee Sanders.

If two soldiers could make it work while dealing with being separated, then he personally applauded them.

But this was _Arturia_ , one who had never expressed an interest in boys. He had heard Ector worry enough over the years to know that she had always kept her focus on her career, never showing an interest in romantic relationship.

The woes of a father. Dreading the moment when their daughter found somebody they liked, only to worry when they _didn't_ find anybody they liked.

But it appeared that little Arturia had indeed found somebody that she liked, and if that kiss was anything to go by she had been keeping this a secret for a while. Now if he could just figure out _how_ she had managed to do so…

His musings were interrupted by a cough from Nihlus, the Turian's mandibles flaring in either embarrassment or amusement.

"So," he mused, "Judging by your expression you weren't aware that the Commander's were in a relationship?"

Anderson hesitated for a moment - would this affect either of their chances to get into the Spectres?

He mentally sighed to himself. At this point, he doubted that anything he said would change anything, seeing as how Nihlus had clearly seen they were in some kind of a relationship.

"No," he finally said, shaking his head. "I had no idea."

The Spectre hummed to himself before shrugging, his mandibles flaring once more. "Well, so long as they show that they are capable, the Spectres won't care if they are together," he concluded before looking at Anderson slyly, "But you should probably warn them that our organization doesn't provide much in the way of maternity leave, and we have a terrible childhood care package."

_Urk!_

Anderson's mind lurched, not able to think of Arturia with kids, and glared at Nihlus, who appeared to be struggling to hold in his laughter.

 _Ok, that mandible flare was totally amusement_ he sighed to himself, feeling relief that this wouldn't affect Arturia. Only to feel worried once more.

_How am I going to explain this to Ector?_

* * *

_**Authors Notes:** _

_**Aaaand Finally finished with this chapter!** _

_**I spent a long time working on this part. Since this was the reunion portion of the story, it was very important to me that I get it right. I rewrote the entire thing three times, changing my mind on the various scenes and how they play out. I mean, I know it's not perfect, but I wanted to make sure that even if the rest of the story doesn't turn out that good that this chapter came out alright.** _

_**Also, I wish that Mass Effect had given us some more details on Arcturus Station. I've seen some concept art of what a Stanford Torus Station is supposed to look like, and it is amazing.** _

_**So, now for explanations. I know that several people complained that I messed up how Shirou does magic, and hopefully my explanation here explains it. This is basically my own understanding of how magic, magic circuits, and magic cores work. If this is incorrect, then hopefully it is good enough that you can still enjoy the story.** _

_**Additionally, some people have expressed concern that Arturia seems more OP than Shirou. I was a little confused with this sentiment, and I think that most people didn't read the part in Arturia's chapter where it states that her magic core is currently inactive. It spiked briefly when she regained her memories, but it fell back to sleep soon after. Currently, both Shirou and Arturia are on the same power level, which at this time is probably a little higher than what Commander Shepherd was in the game.** _

_**Also, I have been informed by several people that Shirou is able to actually use a gun fairly well, which I was not aware of. I have not seen Fate/Extra, nor anything with Alter EMIYA. I must have read that he was unable to use a gun in another story and it stuck with me, so I apologize. However, I'm not too worried about this mistake. Really, my main purpose in that was to provide a medium to explain why Shirou started using an Omni-bow, which I had really wanted him to do. Had I known, I would have used another way. Oooor maybe not. My way was pretty funny :). Once again, I hope that people still enjoy the story despite my blunder.** _

_**Now, I'd like to add an extra section here :) I have noticed that a couple of people in the review section are very curious as to how the heck Merlin was able to become an Admiral, so I figured it wouldn't be out of place to share this with you a little earlier than planned.** _

* * *

**Extra:**

A man sitting in a dark room looked impassively at several displays before him, his glowing eyes indicators of cybernetics. A cigarette hung in his mouth, the tiny embers standing out in the room. Taking the cigarette from his mouth, he tapped away the excess ashes before replacing it, his eyes never leaving the displays.

A call came through and he immediately turned his seat while tapping the device to confirm the call, and a hologram of a beautiful woman came into being. Pale skin and dark hair, her face the picture of professionalism.

The woman was Operative Miranda Lawson, one of the more talented people in the Cerberus, and one that he had been keeping an eye on.

"You wanted to see me sir?" She asked.

"Yes." He replied, focusing his attention on her, "I would like you to start an investigation into two people. Commander Shirou Emiya and Commander Arturia Pendragon."

Almost imperceptibly, Operative Lawson twitched at the name 'Emiya', looking concerned before her features smoothed out once more, "Of course. What exactly is it that I am looking for?"

The man filed her reaction away and tapped a few buttons on another screen bringing up an image of a white haired man, lazily wearing an admirals uniform with a mischievous smile on his face.

"This is Admiral Myrrdin," The man said, waving to the image, "One of the youngest men to make it to the rank of Admiral. His service record is average - doesn't really stand out, nor does he fly under the radar exactly. He has no great military achievements under his belt, and by all appearances the only reason he's managed to get to where he has is due to making numerous friends in high places." The man shrugged. "All in all? A fairly boring individual."

The man took a drink, savoring the burn of the alcohol. "Also," he continued, almost as an afterthought, "a very well crafted fabrication." He finished.

Miranda raised an eyebrow at that, "Sir?"

The man shrugged dismissively. "Nothing concrete," He stated, yet Miranda could see his forehead crease in irritation, "But there are quite a few red flags if you look closely enough. No proof of existence before becoming an officer besides paperwork, managing to be in the right place at the right time on many occasions, his very unmilitary attitude…"

The man paused as he took in some smoke from the cigarette, "He made it to Admiral in record time with minimal effort, but hasn't really done anything with the position. Until," The man gestured towards a report, which enlarged itself for Miranda, "He suddenly pushed hard for both Emiya and Pendragon's names to be put forth to be made Spectres."

His gaze focused once more on Miranda. "I want you to search both of their backgrounds and see if you can find a reason why he would show a sudden interest in them."

Miranda nodded, "Very well sir, I'll see what I can find out." She stated.

"I'm sure that you will," he stated as he leaned back in his chair, "Dismissed." And watched as her hologram dissipated.

The Illusive Man breathed out a plume of smoke and as he thought about the odd Admiral.

Although the man hadn't done anything that would indicate that he was a danger to Cerberus, the Admiral represented a mystery. A man that was more competent than he appeared, but hiding his skills and goals for unknown reasons.

A capable man with unknown goals was difficult to either manipulate or predict, and was therefore a dangerous piece on the board.

Why use his contacts as he had to become an Admiral if he didn't intend to do anything with the position? There were cushier jobs that he could get for less effort.

For that matter, why get a job at all?

When he had first started digging into the white haired man he had found that he was quite active in the stock market. It wasn't immediately obvious as he used a number of assumed names, but the man had been meeting unprecedented success, to the point that the Illusive Man suspected insider trading.

Why would a man like that go into the military?

In the end, he was left only with circumstantial evidence. This is why he had assigned his best agent to look into this matter. If they couldn't find anything by investigating the man himself, they'd see if they could learn anything from his interests.

The Illusive Man relaxed and put the matter out of his mind, looking to other projects that Cerberus was involved in and started looking over their reports.

The Admiral was talented at hiding his intentions, but bit by bit they would be uncovered. He'd know the truth soon enough, and then he would decide whether the man was a danger or not. It was only a matter of time.


	5. Mission: Eden Prime

" _Afternoon everybody, this is your handsome and talented pilot speaking. We will be leaving Arcturus Station in 30 minutes. Please make sure that your business on station is finished, and that everybody is at your station and ready to go at that time."_

Shirou and Arturia listened to the announcement and pulled away from each other reluctantly.

For the past couple of hours they had taken the opportunity to bring each other up to speed on what the other had been up to. What they knew of how they came to be here, as well as what they had done up till them becoming N7's, all the while relishing the opportunity to just be in each other's arms.

Shirou sighed, "So, where exactly do we go from here?" He asked, to which Arturia gave him an arched look.

"I imagine we continue on our mission as we've been assigned." She stated in a matter fact tone. "Us being together hardly changes that." She sighed in annoyance, "As much as it frustrates me to admit it, we can't do anything about why the two of us were brought here, and from what you said, it sounds like Vivian had a hand in this, so I doubt it's detrimental to us at least." She concluded, her eyes narrowed in thought. "For now the best thing we can do is simply focus on completing our current mission and keeping an eye out for the reason why she would assist in bringing us here. Then, after we complete the mission, we'll return to Arcturus Station, and the moment we go on leave you shall be taking me out on a date."

Shirou, who had been listening and nodding along as she gave her analysis, felt his heart skip a beat as he registered her last sentence, and he looked up to see a small dusting of red that spread across her cheeks.

It was really an unfair advantage for her to look like that.

"Not that part," He said in a distracted tone, forcing his mind back to his concerns, "How do we explain that we know each other?"

He watched as Arturia's eyes narrowed in thought, and he could hear her growl under her breath, "I want to say that it's nobody's business but ours." She grumbled before sighing, "Unfortunately, I don't think that that explanation will work with my Father or Kay, and we'll also have a hard time hiding it from Uncle Anderson if we're going to be working under his command."

As she said that, he heard both fondness and exasperation in her voice and couldn't help but smile at it. She truly loved her family, both old and new, and from the sound of it she had taken advantage of this second chance to not to take either of them for granted.

 _Then again, I had done the same thing,_ Shirou thought with a slight chuckle while thinking of Ilya and Talitha, causing Arturia to look at him with a questioning look, "Yeah, it won't work for either of my sisters either." He said ruefully, "Plus, they'll probably be a bit suspicious that you look exactly like the 'pretty lady' I described to them all those years ago."

He saw her blush return and felt a sense of victory for being able to evoke that reaction in her.

From the connection they shared during the Fifth Grail War he knew she didn't particularly care how she looked - A side effect from pretending to be a boy for years. So he was always proud that he was able to make her feel that way by complimenting her.

Unable to resist the urge, he moved in and gave her a quick kiss, enjoying how her cheeks became more rosy in color.

She coughed in embarrassment, "So both of our families will be suspicious of our sudden relationship," She summed up quickly, sighing when he nodded in assent.

They stood in silent contemplation for a few moments, and he took the opportunity to run his hands through her golden hair, enjoying how she hummed in contentment. After a while of this, he spoke up hesitantly, "We could just take this slowly," He proposed reluctantly, "Pretend that we don't know each other until we have the opportunity to 'get to know each other'."

Shirou felt Arturia stiffen under his hand, and her eyes narrowed dangerously. Before she could say anything he hastily brought her into a hug.

"I know," He murmured into her ear, rubbing the small of her back comfortingly, "I don't like the idea either."

And he truly didn't. After looking for her for so long, the last thing that he wanted to do was to pretend that he didn't know her.

Arturia was silent as she thought about it before giving a sigh and relaxing into the hug, returning it.

"That would work," she admitted reluctantly while she began rubbing his back in return. "It doesn't solve the issue of Ilya recognizing your description of me, but we could probably play it off as you just having a type." She teased lightly as she regained a bit of her good mood.

"But!" Her gaze hardened as she moved back to glare at him, "This means that you will be taking me out on a date as soon as we return to Arcturus Station. If we have to pretend to not know each other, then we need to 'rectify' that in the eyes of everybody else as soon as possible."

He gave her a smile, "Is that an order, My King?" He asked teasingly.

He doubted he would ever get tired of seeing her blush. Well, he doubted he would ever get tired of seeing her period - the blush was simply a nice addition.

Her gaze softened, "If need be, then yes." She stated warmly, the hint of a smile dancing on her lips.

He hummed in acknowledgement before continuing, "Then who am I, a humble servant, to refuse the order of a King?" He jested lightly, only for her to tighten her grip on him, and his composure faltered as he found her face right in front of his.

"Never a servant," she murmured softly, and he found himself lost in the vibrant emerald of her eyes, "You are my Sheath, the only one that shall ever hold that title."

He blinked, and all of a sudden she was kissing him, and he didn't bother thinking any more. Apparently he wasn't the only one that enjoyed making the other blush.

After they finished the kiss they remained in a close hug, with Arturia laying her chin on his shoulder. Rubbing his hand across the small of her back, he could hear her hum in contentment, and Shirou couldn't help but thank Lady Vivian once more in his head for this. Whatever cost he'd have to pay for this happiness, he would pay so long as he could remain by her side.

They stayed like that for several minutes, simply soaking in the others presence, before Shirou regrettably drew back with a sigh.

"We should probably head on out now," he said with clear reluctance.

Arturia, for her part, looked at him for a few moments before humming and nodding seriously at him. "You're right. We need to prepare properly for the mission." She stated firmly, causing him to look at her in confusion.

"Hunger is the enemy," she continued, ignoring his look. "Therefore, before we reach our destination, _you_ shall cook a proper meal for the both of us."

Shirou blinked at that. _Not really what I was talking about..._

She gave him a look when he didn't answer at first, and he decided to simply go with it.

He had just been reunited with her after more than fifty years of searching - he was allowed to bask in her presence and sing her praises now. If absence made the heart grow fonder, then his was practically overflowing with the love he had for her.

"I didn't bring much with me, but I should be able to make something," He assured her, absently going through what supplies he had in his head. It was hardly like he would ever refuse her if she wanted something, especially when he could see the hint of anticipation she hid behind her gaze.

"Good," She smiled at him again, and he felt his heart warm at the sight. Her gaze sharpened with purpose and she turned to the door, pulling him along with her. "If that's all, then we should hurry. You should be able to make something before we arrive at Eden Prime."

Shirou let himself be pulled along, letting whatever concern that had filled him dissipate.

Both she and he were N7's. Whatever their 'true' mission was, it surely wouldn't be simple nor safe if it required both of them. Furthermore, they had access to only a fraction of their full power.

And yet, they were together. He was finally strong enough to stand beside her, strong enough to watch her back. He knew he'd never convince her to stay away from danger, so he'd just have to protect her while they were on the battlefield.

He had found his Avalon, the place he desired to be more than anything. And he would not let anything take that from him.

* * *

Arturia sat at the mess hall and happily took a bite out of the sandwiches that Shirou had made. Her beloved was sitting across from her with his own sandwich, and they were enjoying the comfortable silence between them.

Sadly, they didn't have the time for anything complex, but the sandwiches that Shirou made were still extremely satisfying. Arturia took it as a promise of things to come later, feeling joy at the fact that there was indeed going to be a 'later'.

No longer would she wonder when she would see him again, the ache she felt from being away from him for so long was already fading into memory.

Just as he was her Sheath, she was his Sword. Waiting on Avalon, she couldn't help but worry about his safety. Knowing his propensity for throwing himself in front of danger to protect others, it only made her worry increase tenfold. She knew he had the potential to become strong, as strong as any one of her Knights, but he needed to _survive_ in order to reach that potential.

In addition to wanting to eat some of Shirou's food again, she wanted to spend as much time with him alone while she could. She truly hated the idea of keeping their relationship a secret, regardless of the necessity. Even if it was in another life, the oaths that she made as a knight were not invalidated. Not to her. And deception such as this made her uncomfortable.

Hiding the fact that she was a woman certainly hadn't ended well for her, nor for Britain.

She was at least comforted by the fact that she could now protect him at least. True, he was strong - being an N7 gave undeniable proof of that - but there were definitely times that he needed somebody to save him from his own selflessness.

She hoped that they could establish their relationship quickly. How fast did most people move? How long did they date before they were considered together? That wasn't something that she had ever concerned herself with. When she had first fallen in love with Shirou they hadn't needed to be concerned about the opinion of others.

Arturia resolved to send an email to Tess to ask her for her opinion on that. She could be discreet.

Well, when she wanted to anyways…

 _The Normandy_ had lifted off from the docks not too long ago, and was currently on their way to the Mass Relay.

She knew that it would have been a good idea to be in the CIC or the cockpit for this event. To be seen by the crew while the Normandy was going through its maiden voyage, it would help establish their positions and let the crew get comfortable seeing them. Even if they didn't give any orders at the time.

Thankfully, Anderson should be on deck, AND he was the Captain, so that absolved her of that responsibility.

There were some definite perks to not being the person in charge.

Her musing was interrupted by Shirou's comm link, and a voice that she recognized as the pilot came through.

" _Hey Commander, just cleared the Mass Relay. Everything's looking solid up here, but you better brace yourself. I overheard Nihlus say that he was going to try to look for you and commander number 2."_

She saw Shirou frown briefly before answering, "Hmmm, thanks Joker, I appreciate the heads up."

Arturia looked curiously at him even as she finished her sandwich and helped clean what small mess there was. "His parents named him Joker?" She asked skeptically as finished and reluctantly put some distance in between them.

Shirou chuckled in response while putting the small amount of food supplies away, "No, it's just a nickname he got years ago that stuck. You'll have to ask him about it sometime."

Before she could respond they heard footsteps around the corner, followed soon after by a Turian.

Arturia had always been intrigued by the other alien species that they shared the galaxy with. When she had ruled Britain the mere concept of traveling through the stars was so impossible that it hadn't even been considered, let alone there being other planets with creatures similar to humanity. If Merlin had known of this, then he had never shared it with them.

Turians were a tall bipedal avian-like race with metallic carapaces, mandibles around their mouths, and hands that were tipped with claws. If she remembered correctly, the tattoo-like markings on their faces denoted which family they came from.

This particular turian's carapace was dark red in color, with the armor to match. From his walk, Arturia could tell that he was well trained, even if he was trying to be casual right now.

Then again, it's not like she would expect anything different from a Specter.

Once he saw the two of them, the turian's mandibles flared in what she assumed was a smile, "Ah, Commanders, I was hoping to find you two here. I wanted to talk to you before the mission briefing."

Arturia gave the turian a respectful nod, "Specter," She greeted him easily, "It's a pleasure. I am Commander Pendragon, and this," She gestured to Shirou, "Is Commander Emiya." She looked at him curiously as Shirou gave him a smile and nod as well, "Is something wrong? Did Captain Anderson want to see us?"

The Turian shrugged, walking over to the table and leaned up against it, "No no, nothing of the sort. Last I saw him he was talking to an officer on the Command Deck." He assured them as he relaxed, "I just wanted to get to know the couple that was chosen to serve with Captain Anderson," He said casually, "Considering the amount of time and effort that both the Alliance and the Hierarchy have put in this project, the fact that both of you were chosen speaks quite highly of you."

Shirou chuckled lightly, "I'm not so sure about that." He said, looking slightly embarrassed.

Arturia kept a tight hold of her poker face, but she saw Shirou twitch slightly at the word 'couple'.

"Commandy Emiya and I were just getting to know each other as well," She stated carefully, " But I'm afraid that you have us at a disadvantage. I'm sure that you've read our files, and yet there seems to be very little about yourself."

Nihlus let out a chuckle, "Well, you're not wrong about that," he conceded, "The two of you have quite the portfolio. Biotic master, close combat specialist, and Hero of the Skylian Blitz," He listed, nodding towards Arturia, "Sniper, engineer, and Humanity's first Thresher Maw slayer," He said, gesturing towards Shirou. "The two of you are probably the most well known soldiers in the Alliance I'd wager."

Arturia raised her eyebrow at that and shrugged, "We go wherever the Alliance sends us." She said simply.

He chuckled, "True, I suppose." He pushed himself away from the table briefly and stood at attention, "Nihlus Kryik. Formerly of the Hierarchy military, and currently a Specter for the Council." He relaxed and leaned against the table once more.

She gave a polite nod, and saw Shirou do the same out of the corner of her eye even as the Turian looked at her and continued talking.

"To be honest, I really was hoping to just talk to you guys for a bit." He admitted easily.

 _Not an unreasonable request_ she mused.

"What sort of things would you like to know?" Shirou asked curiously, a question she seconded.

"Oh, to start out with, do you know anything about the world we're going to?" He asked curiously, "Eden Prime... I've heard it's quite beautiful. Quite popular among newlyweds and those going on honeymoons."

Arturia kept a tight hold of her poker face, but she saw Shirou's cheeks flush slightly at the statement.

She shrugged nonchalantly and answered for him, "I'm afraid that I haven't had the pleasure." She stated, looking calmly at him. "We're soldiers, not exactly tourists.

"Hmm, but it's more than just a tourist attraction, isn't it?" Nihlus rebutted, looking back and forth at the two of them. "Eden Prime is a symbol of your people, a perfect little world on the edges of your territory. Proof, in fact, that humanity can, not only establish colonies across the galaxy, but also protect them."

This time it was Shirou that shrugged, "It's hardly the only colony at the edge of Alliance territory." He pointed out, "Several have been established by now."

"But none that are as well known as Eden Prime," Nihlus countered. "As well publicized, as successful, as known amongst the other races… But how safe is it really?" He asked, his stare becoming more intent, his words causing her beloved to stiffen.

"Is something going on?" Shirou demanded, and she could tell that the possibility of the settlement being in danger causing him to focus completely on the Turian, "Does it have something to do with why we're going there on our 'shakedown run'?"

Nihlus waved dismissively, "Nothing of that nature," he denied, "But my point is that your people are still newcomers, Commanders, and the galaxy can be a dangerous place. Is the Alliance truly ready for this?"

Arturia raised an eyebrow. This conversation had quickly moved from being just a 'getting to know them' discussion.

"I fail to see how our newcomer status affects our capability," Arturia stated in a neutral tone, thinking about the threats that she had faced in this second life of hers. Not counting the advanced weaponry, the threats themselves seemed rather… Tame, in comparison to some of the threats she encountered as King.

Not that it made them any less important to put down of course, nor did it lessen the danger they presented. However, she'd like to see how well this Turian would have dealt with the likes of Vortigern or Morgan.

"Besides, weren't the Turian's crucial to putting an end to the Krogan Rebellions despite being 'newcomers'?" She continued, noting how he blinked in surprise at her words. "You shouldn't discount us just because we're new. There might be a lot that we don't know about the galaxy, but in that same vein, _you_ don't know a lot about _us._ "

The Specter stared at Arturia for a few moments after her rebuke before suddenly giving a bark of laughter, the tension in the air dissipating with it.

"Well put," He admitted after he got his laughter under control, giving them a grin, "Well put indeed. I was not expecting that response."

Shirou looked at him carefully, "So was there a reason for all that?"

He shrugged, "I wanted to get a better read on you two," he admitted, "I imagine you'll understand the reason later."

Arturia frowned at the vague answer, but before she could say anything back Nihlus turned towards her once more with a smile.

"Now that we've gotten that over with, I have another important question to ask you." He stated, and Arturia felt some trepidation at the tone of his voice. He was hiding it well, but she could have sworn that she heard a bit of mischievousness in his voice…

"Are you currently seeing anybody?"

She felt her heart skip a beat at the strange change in topic, but held firm to her mask. Shirou, on the other hand, had stiffened at the question, and she was grateful that the Specter was looking at her at the moment, and not him.

Keeping her face neutral she shook her head, "I am not." She denied, "It's been difficult to find people that aren't in awe of me ever since the Skylian Blitz. And... I suppose you could say that I've been waiting for the right person to find me." Sticking to the truth as best as she could, she was confused as to where he was leading this.

Keeping his attention on her, he tsked, "Come now, a beautiful girl like you? With your looks and your talent, I'm sure that you've had a whole slew of people that would love to be with you."

Keeping her eye on the Turian, Arturia was still able to see Shirou out of the corner of her eye, and noted the glare that he was now sporting towards Nihlus.

She shrugged, "Whether or not they've asked doesn't change the fact that I'm not interested."

"Huh. Well, their loss." He stated, shaking his head in mock sorrow. "However, once we finish up with what we need to do on Eden Prime, I'd like to ask if you would be willing to take a chance and go out with me? As strong and beautiful as you are, I would consider it an absolute honor. "

Had anything been in Shirou's hands at the time, she was sure that it would have been broken…

She looked impassively at Nihlus for a few seconds. Flattery was hardly a new thing for her. When she was King, many nobles sent their daughters to try to court the young King for their own devices.

It was honestly a relief when she had 'married' Guinevere. As much as she was sorry that Guin had been caught up in all of that drama, it did cut down on the number of propositions that she received every time she made an appearance in court.

The feeling in her gut that she got from this Specter was similar to that which she got from those noblewomen (though the imagery of such made it difficult to keep a straight face…).

The Turian didn't know her personally in any way, and was still very much a stranger to her. As such, his compliments caused the opposite reaction within her even as she tried to figure him out. Trusting her gut, if this was similar to the flattery of those at court, then he had an ulterior motive in this.

She just couldn't figure out what that would be.

Realizing he was still waiting for an answer, Arturia shook her head. "I'm sorry, but I'm afraid that I'm not interested." She declined, noting how he didn't seem very surprised by her rejection.

Instead, he just gave a small chuckle, "Oh c'mon, it would just be a small thing, just between friends," He protested lightly. "I'll just take you out to dinner. I promise I'll be a total gentleman the entire time."

"I'm sorry, but -" before she could finish, he interrupted her.

"You just said that you were looking for the right person," He pointed out, "How do you know that I'm not the right person if you never go out with me? Unless, of course, you already have somebody in your sights?"

She breathed out carefully, "I'm sorry Specter," she said respectfully but firmly, "But I'd rather not get your hopes up for something that will never happen."

"I wouldn't be expecting anything more than a single meal with you," He assured confidently, "I know this great place on the Citadel that -"

Before he could continue, their com links turned on and they heard Anderson's voice.

_Commanders, Specter, meet me in the communications room immediately. A situation has come up._

Nihlus frowned, "Well, that's ominous."

Standing up and heading quickly to the stairs he turned back towards Arturia, "How about we shelve this conversation till after the meeting. We can pick it back up then."

Arturia raised an eyebrow, "Why shelve it if my answer will be the same?"

He just chuckled in response and quickly went up the stairs.

She waited a few beats, and then felt Shirou's arms envelop her from behind, his chin resting on her shoulder, and she allowed herself a moment to relax into them.

"I find myself disliking our plan to keep us a secret even more than before." He murmured softly into her ear while nuzzling her cheek, to which she chuckled and turned around in his arms, giving him a soft kiss.

"This was your idea," She reminded him gently, but with full understanding of what he meant.

He sighed in response, resting his forehead against hers. "I know," he admitted in obvious frustration, and she hummed in understanding.

This time, he leaned in and gave her a quick kiss. "I'm also finding that I really dislike that Turian." He murmured against her lips, and she had to hold back a laugh at that. Instead, she gave him a quick hug.

"You have no reason to be jealous, my Sheath," She said a moment later. "It's only you that I desire by my side. And if I have my way, you will be there for many years to come."

She removed herself from the hug after that, "Come, it will look suspicious if we don't get there soon."

And with that, Sword and Sheath both started heading towards the captain's quarters, none of the crew realizing nor noting how Commander Emiya seemed to be standing much closer to Commander Pendragon than before.

* * *

_Nihlus Kryik POV_

Nihlus couldn't help but chuckle as he swiftly made his way to Anderson, knowing that the crew he passed by was giving him an odd look as he did so, but couldn't find it within himself to care.

Not caring about how others viewed him was one of the reasons he was disliked amongst the Turian military. It had, of course, been tempered over the years, but it was never fully gone.

Such as this instance. He was beginning to find that it was oddly fun teasing these humans.

He hadn't been planning on taunting them like he had, but after Commander Pendragon was able to answer his question in such a way he couldn't help it. Had she not been taken, he truly would have been tempted to take her himself.

He was disappointed that he was unable to garner any reaction from her. Honestly, her poker face could rival that of an Elcor... However, the male commander's expressions more than made up for it.

Commander Emiya seemed like a genuinely nice guy from what his sources said, so the fact that he managed to get the commander to glare at him like that in such a short amount of time was quite the achievement in his humble opinion.

He'd have to clear it up with them later, if they did indeed manage to become Specters like he suspected they would. But that would wait until after they came clean to him regarding their relationship. Until then he would have his fun.

He arrived at the Communications Room and felt his good mood evaporate. Captain Anderson wore a serious face, with the tension in the room practically palpable.

"Specter," The captain greeted absently, and Nihlus nodded back.

"What's the issue?"

The captain breathed out heavily, "We just connected to the comm buyou and received a message. It looks like somebody got wind of the package."

Nihlus grimaced. They had moved as fast as they could to retrieve the Prothean Beacon from Eden Prime so they could avoid this sort of thing. That the Normandy was up for a test drive was very fortuitous timing, and should have given them a degree of speed and secrecy.

Clearly it hadn't been enough.

The commanders both entered the room and approached Anderson. Pendragon looked as composed as ever, and Emiya was sporting a serious look. They could sense that something was wrong.

"Captain?" Pendragon asked, her voice all business, and Anderson let out a deep breath.

"I was hoping to explain this to you differently," he said, clearly annoyed, "But we don't have that kind of time anymore. What do you two know about the Prothean race?"

Leaning back, Nihlus observed as Pendragon remained silent with a raised eyebrow, while Emiya perked up.

"The Protheans are a race that went extinct about 60,000 years ago." He recited, "It's because of one of their data caches that we found on Mars that humanity advanced as far as they did before coming across the Citadel races. Stuff like the Citadel and the Relays were also created by them." He folded his arms and studied both Captain and Specter, "But what does that have to do with our mission?"

Nihlus decided to pick it up from here, "Prothean artifacts are as valuable as they are rare." He stated bluntly, "The more intact, the rarer. As such, they're prime targets for raiders and bandits, as well as other less scrupulous individuals."

"How valuable?" Pendragon asked, brow furrowed in thought.

"One repository was enough to catapult humanity's technology centuries ahead of what it was, and that was just a small data cache." Anderson replied in a tired voice, "Intact Prothean technology could be the find of the millennia. Not just for humanity, but for all species." and both of the Commanders nodded in understanding.

"I assume that such an artifact was found on Eden Prime?" Emiya asked, before looking confused, "How many raiders could there be to threaten a settlement of Eden Prime's size?"

Nihlus could understand the confusion. Although he questioned the commanders regarding the safety of the settlement not too long ago, the military presence on the planet wasn't small.

Eden Prime might be primarily a farming world, but the Alliance took the safety of its citizens seriously ever since Mindoir a decade ago, and with over three million citizens living there, that was a lot of lives to care about.

 _Most likely a small group of talented thieves then._ He decided. Possibly a strike force or two as a distraction, a talented tech to disrupt communication, followed by a few actual thieves to do the extraction. With how little time that they had they'd have to prepare for this, that's the most they'd be able to scrounge up.

That's how he'd do it anyways.

Anderson rapidly typed on his terminal, "Joker patched this through to us not too long ago. We received it as soon as we linked to the communication line."

A video popped up, and silence reigned as they viewed the footage.

The video showed a grim picture, with numerous Alliance soldiers on the ground bleeding and dying. Explosions and debris flew in the background, and gunfire was a constant in the background. There was an Alliance Soldier holding the camera towards himself,

"We're under attack! Heavy casualties on the southern and eastern portions of the city, and the others are pinned down! They came out of nowhere, and we need evac-"

A loud mechanical groan permeated through the air, causing all of the soldiers to pause and look in the air. From the camera, they can see a gigantic flagship rise into the clouds, red lightning surging around it.

The video cuts out, and Nihlus pushed down the feeling of unease he had.

_Ok, so not a small group of talented thieves…_

"The video cuts out after that," Anderson reported, "Most likely them jamming the signals. ETA is 15 minutes, and our stealth systems are going to get their test run. Our landing point will be as close to this transmission point as we can get. Commanders," He addressed the two in front of him, "Pick a couple of people for a team. Your mission is to stay unnoticed as long as you can and to find and secure the Prothean Beacon. We'll drop you off close to where this transmission took place, and I'll send you the location of the dig site."

Emiya had a frown on his face, but was cut off by Anderson before he could say anything, "Your mission is to secure the Beacon. This attack is clearly designed to acquire it, so it is vital that we prevent that. The civilians should have reached the shelters before the attack started, and the best way to help them at this point is to get the enemy to leave, which they should do once the artifact is under our protection."

The frown didn't leave Emiya's face, but he didn't look as troubled after that, and Nihlus noted that Anderson relaxed a bit after that before continuing. "After we drop you off, the Normandy will stay nearby while stealthed. We don't dare do anything while that unknown starship remains where it is, but once it leaves we'll rush in to provide what help we can."

Upon finishing, he looked between the two of them. "Any questions?"

Both shook their heads, and Anderson then looked at Nihlus. "Can I trust that we'll have your help in this?" He asked, almost rhetorically, and Nihlus nodded, all traces of his teasing self gone.

"I work better alone, so I'll scout ahead and do my best to guide you." He stated seriously, and the other two nodded.

"Very well, hurry and assemble your squads." Anderson ordered, "We'll be entering Eden Prime's atmosphere soon."

The other two left, but Nihlus hung back for a bit. As soon as the door closed, he looked curiously at Anderson, "Experience with Emiya in the past?" He inquired, and Anderson shook his head.

"I was warned," He admitted ruefully, "To Emiya, the main priority has always been for the protection of others. You need to phrase orders to make it clear how those orders benefit them the most."

Nihlus narrowed his eyes in thought, "Well, that's not always going to be possible." He muttered softly, and Anderson gave a tired chuckle.

"Tell that to him," He replied with a small smile, "He's managed to do a pretty good job thus far."

A grunt was all Nihlus gave as a reply. After a few seconds he spoke up again, "You didn't tell them that this would serve as a trial to becoming Specters?"

"No," Anderson shook his head, "No need. They'll already perform at their best. Telling them that wouldn't accomplish anything. Besides, this will give you a better view of how they perform naturally, won't it?" His eyes snapped back to his computer and he started typing something down, "Better get ready, our ETA is coming fast."

Nihlus just smirked, "Don't worry, I'm always ready," and started heading out. Right before he exited the door he called back, "After we finish here, I'll be asking the Commander on a date. So, wish me luck!" And closed the door before Anderson could reply back.

Allowing himself the chance to laugh for a few seconds, he straightened himself and forced himself to become more serious before heading out to double check his guns.

* * *

_Eden Prime_

The city lay empty, its citizens either having made it to a shelter after the attack had been announced, or they lay dead and were being collected by their attackers.

The attackers themselves were a combination of steel and synthetic muscles, their primary feature were their heads, which was a large glowing ocular lens, resembling a bright flashlight.

Though none of the city's military were aware of it, the invaders were known as Geth, a synthetic race of AI that were created by the Quarians. Having gone rogue three hundred years prior, they had remained in their quadrant and became the bogeymen of the galaxy, forgotten by most galactic citizens.

Until now.

Not that that information would have been of much use to them, of course.

The Alliance forces assigned to the protection of the settlement had been split, resulting in pockets of fighting throughout the area. Unfortunately, the humans were steadily being beaten back.

The speed of the assault, in addition to the sheer size or their main starship, allowed the Geth to take control of the ground to air missile defenses. Combined with the jamming signal coming from the starship, the military was effectively prevented from properly mobilizing. Those facts also prevented the other settlements on Eden Prime from sending any military assistance.

Hidden in one of the empty buildings in the cargo train station far from the colony stood a Turian, his attention focused on his Omni-tool as he ignored the activity going on outside. Every once and a while he could be seen typing out orders and sending them out.

A small map and message appeared over his Omni-tool, and had anybody been close to him they would have seen his eyes narrow at what he saw.

The star port containing the Prothean Beacon had been well defended, and fighting was still occurring in that area. They couldn't afford to use their ship weaponry against the star port itself, else they might destroy the Beacon. He also couldn't assign more Geth to the area, since he needed them to keep the surviving military away from the Beacon. Nor could he assist in the fighting himself since he couldn't risk the chance of word getting out that he had been here.

Thus, he was relegated to coordinator and tactician.

When he had arrived with the Geth, he had been hoping that the Beacon would still be at the dig site. They would have been able to rush in, overwhelm whatever pitiful protection the humans could have scrounged, grab the Beacon, and rush out before anybody realized what was happening.

Honestly, he couldn't remember when a plan had actually gone 'according to plan'... Well, there was that one time at his family reunion years ago that actually did, but most people probably wouldn't count that as a mission.

Those same people clearly didn't know his family…

It hadn't taken long for the Geth to hack the computers and figure out where the Beacon had been taken to. The more Geth there were in one location, the more they could network with each other and the smarter they became and he had a couple thousand of the AI's with him. It had been almost insultingly easy to break into their logs.

Them moving the Beacon to the spaceport made sense, even if it was annoying. Closer to the city meant more people to fight. Not that they stood a chance of course, but it would take longer, increasing the chances of the reinforcements arriving. And more importantly, more people that could see him and report that he had been here.

His thoughts were interrupted by a ping on his omni-tool, informing him that one of the patrols had been wiped out, and he immediately brought the feed from those Geth up. Looking at the last few recorded moments, he saw several humans in better quality armor firing at the robots.

What was that human saying? 'Speak of the goat-man and he shall appear.' Weren't the humans always complaining about how other humans were late? Why couldn't he have gotten those humans?

He was aware that he was cutting it close, that his window of opportunity was perilously short, but he had no choice. The moment he had heard that the Prothean Beacon had been found he had been lucky he was able to mobilize enough of the Geth to make this raid possible before the Citadel sent somebody.

Still, this was within the mission parameters, and so he settled back and observed the group before making a decision.

After watching them fight for a few minutes, having to change views occasionally, he felt a ripple of grudging respect go through him.

The first human was practically a rookie. Oh, he fought well enough, but there was a stiffness to his moves, the way he kept glancing around in a distracted manner betrayed his green status.

Two others seemed more competent. One, the female, had been tagged by the Geth as part of one of the remaining groups of military they had been fighting. A soldier with solid skills. The male was obviously a biotic, and a decently powered one if he was judging correctly.

It was the final two that gave him pause. He was aware that Nihlus had been sent to test a couple of potential applicants for the Spectres, and assumed that these two were they. He hadn't been interested in learning more about the humans at the time, but he found himself slightly regretting that now.

The male had medium armor with red and black colors. Wearing dual Omni-tools that actively glowed, one had a large bow coming up from it, with the tell-tale blue hues of mass effect field reinforcement. The Omni-tool on his other hand flash forged arrows for him, and several more such arrows could be seen over his shoulder as well.

A weapon style no doubt influenced by the Talon Mercenaries - one of the more obscure groups that had been fighting for a place amongst the mercenaries on Omega for some years now.

There were key differences between this man and they he noted. The Talon's bow was small, and utilized grenades with their arrows to devastating effect. The few times he had observed them, he had judged them to be decent mid-range combatants. This man's bow, however, was large, almost as tall as the wielder, and he seemed to have much farther range and power. Furthermore, his arrows didn't appear to utilize grenades like theirs did. Perhaps he was conserving them?

 _Not that he appears to need them_ , the Turian thought as he watched one such arrow rip through one of his Geth. He frowned and sent a command for a Geth to collect an arrow. Instead of the tried and true shape that the Talon's had mastered, the arrows this man used were a unique, twisted shape that he found himself curious about.

A sniper with a bow and arrow. Against guns and robots. He would have laughed at the ludicrousness of it had he not been watching them shear through the Geth's armor.

The other person, female, had heavy white armor with blue and gold trim. He flinched reflexively as he watched the woman use biotics to 'Charge' a group of Geth, instantly appearing in their midst and sending them flying. Those closest to her after that were treated to a close up view of her shotgun.

He had gone up against asari commandos in the past that used similar techniques, though never against one with heavy armor. Asari in general seemed to prefer lighter equipment, depending on their biotics and dexterity to defend them. He was curious how much the increased weight added to that charge…

Not that he had any intention of finding that out personally.

As he watched the group slowly make their way into the scientist's camp, those two stood out to him like a bonfire.

Not because of their skill, though they were far better than the others in the group. In his job he had worked with and against the best that the galaxy had to offer. STG's, Asari Commandos, Krogan Battlemasters, Elcor Artillery Specialists, to name a few. These two were good, but as far as skill goes, they would need to do better to impress him.

Instead, what stood out to him was how they worked together.

He could see it in the entire group - this was the first time they had worked together. Oh, as somebody gained experience they could mitigate how badly it showed, but it was still obvious to an experienced soldier.

Those two however…

His arrows would pick off key combatants, distracting them and leaving them open to when she charged them. She freely turned her back on enemies, as if knowing that he would protect her. The Geth would fire at the others, and she would leap back to defend him with a biotic shield while he rained death from afar. She obviously trusted him with her back, and he trusted that she would cover him.

It wasn't perfect - it didn't appear that they were fully familiar with each other's moves - yet they made it work. And their knowledge in each other's fighting style was almost visibly increasing as the fight went on. He watched with detached curiosity as she 'Warped' a stone outcropping, only for an arrow to rip through the weakened stone to strike the Geth crouched behind it.

Their synergy was truly impressive, and he watched the oddly beautiful sight of them going across the battlefield, with the other three picking off stragglers and performing over-watch.

The two might have been unfamiliar with the dance, but they had complete trust in each other as they flowed across the battlefield, creating their own song that left the Geth struggling to catch up.

As a Turian, he could respect that bond.

He watched closely as they entered the center of the human scientist's base camp, one of the locations that the Geth had used to set up the… Spikes… that they had received and used.

The Turian couldn't prevent the uneasy feeling in his gut at the thought of those artifacts. The Geth considered it a gift from their 'deity'. Ten foot tall spikes that impaled the corpses of humans and replaced their innards with cybernetics, turning them into cybernetic zombies of a sort.

Though they were dangerous, they had to actually get within melee range, which would normally be difficult to do. Their main advantage, however, was the mental and emotional impact that they had on their opponents. That hesitation was often enough for the corpses to get within range. Combined with firepower from the Geth, and they made a truly deadly combo.

He watched as the spikes lowered, the husks sliding off the spikes and slowly standing on their own…

Only to be blown apart before they had taken a single step.

The Turian watched along with the other three humans, stunned, as the two systematically destroyed the husks before they even had a chance to do anything.

That was… Unusual. Even he, when he had first seen the spikes in action, had had a few moments where he could only watch the disturbing scene as the corpses of the recently departed attacked the living. Yet those two had reacted with extreme prejudice from the beginning.

Dozens of husks fell in the span of a few seconds, the two merciless in their assault.

He forced his thoughts back on track. Unusual or not, it put him in an even worse position if he couldn't depend on the husks to slow down the humans.

He cursed quietly as he immediately sent out orders to several other pockets of Geth to intercept the human group and to focus completely on delaying. Ambush tactics and guerrilla warfare only. With the troops and the time frame that he had, there was no way he could win in a straight up fight. Potential witnesses or not, he needed to get access to the beacon and leave, as soon as possible.

Before he could move to the train, he spotted movement at the base of the building where he was at, and for the first time since arriving at Eden Prime he felt the stirrings of worry within him.

Nihlus Kryik, probably one of the best Spectres that the Citadel had to offer, had arrived.

There was no way that he would be able to activate the Beacon before Nihlus got close enough, and Nihlus was familiar enough with him that he'd recognize who he was instantly.

It was, he supposed, a stroke of good luck that he spotted the other Turian right here, right now. He could take out the threat immediately, without having to worry about the humans seeing him.

The Turian stood up and made his way out of the building silently.

It would be better - safer - to take out the Spectre from a distance. He was heavily armed, he would be on hair trigger alert, it was careless to let anybody see his face in this venture, to name but a few.

And yet… He couldn't. He was sure that he could come up with a reason if he thought about it, yet he didn't bother.

The other deserved more than being killed in such a way.

After all, Nihlus was the only Spectre that he, Saren Arterius, had ever trained.

* * *

Saren walked from the side of the building, purposefully making noise, causing Nihlus to jerk towards his direction with his weapon aimed at the other, only for his eyes to widen in recognition, "Saren?" He stated incredulously, "What are you doing here?"

_Flashback_

_He watched the young Turian clean the latrines while muttering rebelliously and couldn't help but snicker. The boy had made a decision that had actually saved quite a few lives, but at the expense of going against orders._

_While his superiors were happy with the results they couldn't allow disobedience to go unpunished. Thus, the young Turian was punished via cleaning duty. A tried and true punishment that carried over amongst all races._

_While his attitude was ill suited for the military, his abilities were unquestionable, and Saren saw a lot of potential in him._

_Checking his Omni-tool, he made sure that he had the name correct, and walked over to make his presence known._

" _Nihlus Kryik I assume?"_

_Nihlus spun around in surprise, mandibles flared, and his eyes widened in recognition of the other, "Specter?" He stated incredulously, "Spectre Arterius? What are you doing here? Uh, Sir?"_

_End Flashback_

Saren gave a small chuckle, "Relax, the council just thought that you could use some help on this one."

He watched as Nihlus seemed to accept this answer and lowered his pistol. "Oh c'mon," Nihlus said lightly as he kept watch over the area, "I know that this is my first time judging a potential Specter, but I _can_ do this one my own you know," He stated while chuckling, "Still a helicopter parent I see."

_Flashback_

" _Oh c'mon!" Nihlus groaned, and Saren had to hide a laugh at his tone. "This may be my first mission as a Spectre, but I'd like to think that I've proven myself somewhat competent!" He glared at Saren for a bit, "Honestly, I feel bad for any kids of yours. You're such a helicopter parent."_

_End Flashback_

Saren shrugged, "It's not every day that an intact Prothean Beacon is found," he said, attempting levity, "I finished my last mission early, so they sent me ahead to give you some competent backup."

Nihlus sighed, "We've been through this before," he said, his sub vocals giving a disapproving hum. "These humans aren't all that bad." His hum turned into a chuckle, "And they're pretty fun to tease as well," he said with a smirk.

_Flashback_

_He was sitting at a bar, clutching his drink while his anger burned in his chest._

_Today was the anniversary of the day that his brother had been killed. By those_ _**humans** _ _._

_He heard his glass start to crack, but didn't pay it any mind. It wasn't until somebody plopped down into the seat next to him that he looked up, and he saw Nihlus reach over and pry his hand from the glass._

" _You really shouldn't have any more, sir." He told Saren in a neutral tone, and Saren felt a surge of irritation._

" _It's either this, or I go out and show the humans what true terror is," He growled, and Nihlus sighed and whacked the back of Saren's head._

" _It was a war," he stated with a shrug. "We killed them, they killed us. That's what war is. Have you ever tried actually talking to them?"_

_Saren looked at him incredulously, and Nihlus chuckled grimly, "Yeah, I suppose not. They really aren't all that bad you know."_

_End Flashback_

Nihlus sighed in aggravation as he turned to look inside the rest of the building, "Geth," he muttered, "Several hundred years of staying beyond the Perseus Veil and they come out now. The Council isn't going to be pleased."

Saren stared at the back of Nihlus's head, slowly drawing his pistol and aiming it at the back of Nihlus's head, "Don't worry," he said, hearing the hollow tone in his voice.

"I've got it under control."

_Flashback_

_Saren looked across the table at Nihlus, the two of them enjoying a quiet meal between missions. They didn't have the opportunity to get together as often these days, and it was a nice opportunity to unwind._

" _So, not upset that I'm on track to take the number one Spectre position from you?" Nihlus asked with a smirk as he lifted his mug to drink._

_Saren scoffed, "C'mon, what's the saying? You'll never be as great as I once was? I don't care how old you get, I'll always see you as the brat I found cleaning the latrines." He smirked, "That's assuming of course that you ever do manage to become better than I currently am. That's still very much in debate I'll have you know."_

_The two shared a chuckle, and Nihlus gave a genuine smile at him. "Well, what better way to show my appreciation than by surpassing you?" He leaned over the table and clapped his hand to Saren's shoulder, "Whatever else happens sir, I'm grateful for everything you've done for me."_

_End Flashback_

***BANG!***

* * *

Arturia slammed her shoulder in a biotic charged blow into the walking corpse, ignoring how it fell apart over her as she absently 'Pushed' a small group of the things nearby while aiming her shotgun at another one closer to her.

The moment they had come into the courtyard they observed several dozen ten foot tall metallic spikes, each impaling a corpse. Some wearing civilian garb, some as scientists, and others with armor. Each had horrible, blackened skin with blue veins running across their faces.

When they each started lowering she had seen the alarm on Shirou's face, and instinctively moved to attack as Shirou brought up his bow. When the corpses stood on their own and moved to charge, they were met with a solid wall of biotics and metal almost instantly.

She glared at the various liquids on her armor, and was extremely grateful for the filters in her helmet. The dead without armor didn't hold together very well, resulting in her becoming covered in a variety of filth she didn't care to analyze.

"Ok, what the heck was that?!" Corporal Jenkins demanded, his tone incredulous after the last of them fell. "Those… Things… They were dead, but they were still walking! They had a freaking hole in their stomach!"

The new soldier they had picked up, Gunnery Chief Ashley Williams, spoke up shakily, "Those… They used to be my team…" her voice cracked, "My _friends_."

Grimacing, Arturia's heart went out to her. She had probably just lost most of the people that she knew in one fell swoop, and to have to fight their corpses so soon after…

She hadn't completely fallen apart yet, which is more than most could say after going through something so traumatic, combined with her first experience of seeing something that should be impossible, and for that she had Arturia's respect.

"I'm sorry," she said, letting her hear the compassion in her voice. "They, all of them, deserve a burial. But we can't give them that right now. We can only make sure they can't be used like this again."

She watched as Ashely took a few deep breaths, eventually straightening. "Right, sir. I apologize for my lapse, sir."

Shirou walked up to her and gently placed a hand on her shoulder while keeping a careful eye out, "It's fine," he said in a soothing voice, "It's natural to have that kind of reaction. Unfortunately, now isn't a good time to grieve for them. So keep it together until we get back to the ship, ok? You can deal with it then."

Ashley nodded, and the others gingerly made their way around the now empty spikes and pile of corpses, staying away from the spikes.

Soon after they had been dropped off by the Normandy, they had been beset by several unknown drones. After dispatching them and making their way to the dig site, they ran into the soldier, Williams, who had had her entire squad killed, and was being chased by more drones until they had saved her.

They had learned from Ashley that the scientists had moved the Beacon to the spaceport the previous day, leaving the site empty. Traveling further had led them to the scientist's base camp, where they had soon come across this area filled with these nightmarish spikes.

Traveling around the spikes, keeping as much space in between them as they could, she glanced towards Shirou questioningly, and he shook his head.

"No scent of magic," He said quietly, making sure the others couldn't hear. "It… looks like they were created by technology." He finished in an incredulous tone.

She breathed out heavily, thinking furiously. That news was... both a relief and very worrisome.

On one hand, no magic meant that this wasn't the work of a Dead Apostle, which would have been disastrous.

Once, during her reign, she and her knights accompanied Merlin to a castle that had been taken over by some dark force. Merlin had been more serious than she had ever seen him when they had been informed of it, and he had recommended immediate action.

While the court wizard might have taken care of the monster himself, she and her knights had to fight the poor victims of the vampire-like creature. Though her Knights hadn't complained, she knew that it had been hard for all of them, even Mordred. They, all of them, had sworn oaths to protect the people of the realm, and despite being dead those they fought still wore the faces of the citizens.

By the time the battle was over, the entire village and castle lay empty and desolate. It might have ended in a victory for them, but it certainly hadn't felt like one.

She was not aware of the exact mechanics of how Dead Apostles operated, and wasn't sure if, unlike Shirou, they could use magic outside the confines of Gaia. She would need to ask about that later.

Knowing that this was not them though was a relief... And yet, knowing that somebody had found a way to mimic that same nightmare with technology robbed her of that relief just as quickly.

Still, that was a matter to concern themselves about later.

The scientist's camp consisted of numerous offices and living domiciles surrounding a large open space, with a large mess hall closest to the center. It was in front of the mess hall that the drones took advantage of the space and installed those spikes, creating a forest of metal. Past the modular buildings, numerous excavation machines could be seen rising above everything.

"S-should we, I don't know, check the buildings for survivors?" Jenkins asked nervously, flinching when Arturia immediately shook her head.

"The raiders have been here for a couple hours now, so it's highly unlikely that anybody still remains." She stated.

"B-but what if somebody's still -" He began to say, only to stop when Shirou interrupted him.

"Which building do we check?" He asked rhetorically, gesturing to the dozens that surrounded them. "Unless we have an idea that somebody is around, we'd be wasting our time. And if they've found a hiding spot that's good enough to hide themselves from the raiders, then it's unlikely we'll have an easier time of it."

Jenkins didn't say anything for several seconds as they traveled, eventually grimacing. "I-I guess you're right." He said in a frustrated voice, "I just…"

Shirou let out a worn out chuckle, "I know how you feel," He assured him with sympathy and understanding. "But you need to remember that we're not alone -"

She couldn't help it. For Shirou to say something like that? She turned and raised an eyebrow at him, giving him a skeptical look. A look that he steadfastly ignored.

" - We're only a group of five." He continued, "Once the Normandy received the distress call, it sent a message to the rest of the military, so there should be reinforcements coming. They'll be better equipped to help the survivors."

Jenkins let out a relieved chuckle, "Ah, right, that makes sense."

"However," Shirou continued, his gaze hardening, "If we see a situation where a civilian is in danger…"

"Then we will perform our duties and protect them as best as we can." Arturia interjected smoothly.

They made their way slowly through the camp, Williams and Jenkins leading the way, Shirou close behind them. The buildings weren't very tall, only a rare few surpassing one story, but there were many. Which made sense - the discovery of Prothean ruins would have attracted the attention of a horde of scientists and researchers.

All around they could see the signs of combat, thick lines and indents gouged out of the walls and in the paved ground. Burnt marks and blood could be found in abundance, but no signs of corpses.

It was already very clear what happened to them…

Suddenly, Shirou grabbed the Corporal by the arm and yanked him aside, creating an arrow with the same motion, notching it, and launching it into the second-floor window of an apartment module.

Arturia immediately pushed Ashley and Alenko behind the building as well, waiting for a few beats as Shirou fired several more arrows in quick succession before fully moving behind the building himself.

Cocking an eye at Shirou, even as the others looked at them confused, Shirou shrugged. "Snipers," he replied simply, "The drones are adapting."

"Shit!" Alenko swore, looking more worried than angry. "That means they're being actively controlled. Which means somebody knows we're here." He looked at Shirou, "Say Commander, you're a tech guy, right? Can't you, I don't know, hack them or something?"

Shirou shook his head, "I tried a few programs when we first encountered them," he explained, "They're running some kind of system I'm not familiar with, so there's not much I can do." He thought about it for a second before looking hopefully at them, "Unless one of you thought to bring EMP-grenades?"

Everybody looked down at that, and Shirou shrugged, "Well, that means we're stuck with the old fashioned way then."

Alenko groaned, "Well, that still doesn't address the fact that they're aware that we're here."

Arturia shrugged, "We accepted that that was a possibility the moment we stepped in to save Chief Williams." She replied simply without regret, and knowing that the others, Shirou especially, didn't either.

Shirou huffed, "Remind me why we didn't bring the Mako?" He asked Arturia rhetorically.

She gave him a small wry smile back, "Perhaps because the Captain wanted this to be a stealth mission?"

Alenko snorted, "Yeah, well, we can see how well that turned out, can't we?"

"Alright, that's enough," She insisted, immediately gaining everybody's attention. "We don't have a choice then, and we're running out of time. Everybody, keep a close eye on your shields. I have the heaviest armour, and I can reinforce them with my 'Barrier', so I shall lead. Emiya, keep an eye out for more snipers and try to pick them off. Williams, follow suit. Alenko, Jenkins, keep your heads down, and provide cover fire when necessary."

Everybody nodded and she led them out cover, immediately feeling bullets impact her barrier, only to see arrows fly out towards some windows, followed by more bullets.

She hid a grimace as she fed more power into her barrier and pushed onward, feeling the burn of biotics across the base of her skull where her implant was located.

She hated this type of combat. While she understood why the enemy would employ it, it was a pain to deal with, and the best strategy against it was simply too slow if they wanted to accomplish their objective.

It irked her to no end to potentially leave enemies behind them, but without knowing their numbers and with the drones avoiding conventional combat they had no idea how long a prolonged battle would cost them. So she grit her teeth and continued to feed power into her 'Barrier', trusting that Shirou would take out the shooters as soon as they fired, and pressed onward.

Moving as they were, they soon made it out of the camp, breathing a sigh of relief only for Arturia to 'Throw' them out of the way and into cover behind a rock as more bullets rained down from more of the drones behind the cover of some trees ahead of them.

Following behind them into cover she felt her eyes narrow in annoyance as she waited for her shields to regenerate.

 _That Specter better appreciate the distraction we're causing for him,_ she thought in frustration as she gathered her energy for another 'Charge', nodding gratefully at Shirou when she saw him wordless draw another arrow.

* * *

Shirou's POV

Their progress had been frustratingly slow even after leaving the camp. While the strange drones continued to fight from afar, they thankfully didn't appear to have very many snipers amongst their ranks.

Unfortunately, Shirou couldn't find it in himself to be thankful for this small fact as he glanced at the squad's status monitor yet again.

That Arturia took it upon herself to make herself the focus of the drones played absolute havoc with Shirou's stress, and he found himself constantly glancing at the status of her shields to make sure that it was still at acceptable levels.

It was easy to understand WHY she was doing it. But that didn't make him any happier about it.

He absently made a mental note to do some work on her armor when they got back. Her armor's shields drained _way_ too quickly for his comfort.

He was usually very composed during fights, despite people calling him reckless. Panicking or acting rashly was the enemy, as he had learned from his love. While he didn't like when his King suppressed her emotions, there was a benefit to doing that in combat so long as one took the time to let those emotions out afterwards.

But now he found himself filled with multiple emotions that he couldn't fully suppress.

Seeing the techno zombies had definitely shaken him, bringing to mind the Dead Apostle Hunts that he had assisted the Church in all those years ago. Those were... rough on him, and he felt dread that somebody had managed to mimic a way to accomplish this with technology.

Watching as these drones focused their attacks on Arturia filled him with no small amount of frustration and anger. Frustration that it was she who was shielding him, taking hits for him, and anger that something **dared** to take the woman he loved away from him so soon after he had found her, and he found himself fighting all the more furiously at this thought, irrational as it was.

And lastly, he realized that he felt… happy, oddly enough.

For years, she had been the standard by which he held himself at. She was the strongest person that he knew, and it had been his goal since the Holy Grail War to become strong enough to stand by her side, to not be a burden to her.

And now, he was finally able to do so.

True, she was no longer a Servant, but that hardly mattered. In this battle, here and now, he was fighting by her side as an equal. And that fact alone brought a measure of peace and happiness he wasn't expecting.

Now if these robots would only stop SHOOTING AT ARTURIA so he could appreciate those emotions…

"What the- Tell me that's not what I think it is!?"

Coming to attention immediately at the sound of the Corporal's frightened exclamation, Shirou focused on the area and found his own eyes widen. With no enemies in sight, the group cautiously made their way to the storage building and Shirou quickly brought out his Omni-tool, grimacing as he did so.

He might not have liked the guy, but he certainly didn't want to see Nihlus dead.

"But, but, he was a Specter!" Jenkins cried out in disbelief, "Those guys are the best of the best! T-they said that he could take out a whole platoon all by himself! If something was able to take him down, then what chance -"

"Then we will do our job and finish the mission." He heard Arturia interrupt firmly, "Calm down corporal. That he was taken down does NOT affect our objective."

The others continued talking, but Shirou ignored them in favor of investigating the corpse. He quickly selected one of his custom medical programs, one that he affectionately named Structural_Grasp_Bio , and ran it over the turian corpse.

After a few minutes, he stood up, and the other's went silent.

"He's been dead for about thirty minutes," he summarized, "One shot to the back of the head from at close range, probably a heavy pistol. I'd guess it happened soon after we got to the base camp."

"The back of the head at close range?" Jenkins asked incredulously, "It would have to have been some kind of super assassin in order to take out a Specter!"

"Or," Arturia stated softly with a distant look in her eye, "It was somebody who he never thought would betray him."

He knew she was strong, that those events she was no doubt thinking of happened long ago… Yet he still yearned to reach out and hug her, to do what he could to help her.

He hated seeing her in pain.

"Why'd they leave his body here?" Ashley asked in confusion, "They've taken everybody else and put them on those spikes."

"Who knows," Alenko replied, nervously glancing around. "Could have been any number of reasons. Maybe those weird spikes only work on humans. Or maybe they didn't have time."

 _Both were decent possibilities…_ Shirou thought grimly as he investigated, noting that not even the weapons or armor had been taken.

A sudden sound caused everybody to aim their guns at the building, and a startled shout came out, "W-w-wait! D-don't shoot! I'm not one of them!"

A skinny man wearing civilian garb and black beanie slowly came out from behind some crates, haunted eyes darting back and forth fearfully, "Oh man, am I glad to see you guys," he said in relief, gulping nervously until they all slowly lowered their weapons.

"Who are you, and what are you doing here?" Arturia demanded, causing the man to flinch.

"H-hey now, n-no need to worry, I'm just a worker here, that's all!" He hastily stated, eyes darting back and forth between all members of the group frantically, "M-my name's Powell. And I, w-well, I was able to hide behind the crates here once the attack started." He licked his lips nervously. "They must have missed me, you know?"

Shirou saw Arturia's eyes narrow in suspicion, and stepped forward. "It's fortunate that you were able to get behind the crates before they realized you were there," He stated, noting how the man subtly flinched, "Were you there when this happened?" He gestured to where Nihlus's corpse lay.

Powell nodded jerkily, "Y-yeah, I did. That guy, he arrived all decked to the teeth and everything, and I-I was debating on whether I should reveal myself. You know, you can never tell with Turian's, right?" His chuckle died in his throat when nobody joined him, and he coughed uncomfortably, "Um, so, right when I was about to come out, another Turian came out and started talking to him."

Shirou straightened at that info, and he saw Arturia and the others stiffen as well.

"They talked like they knew each other, even joked around a bit, like bro's, you know?" He continued, "I, I think he called him Saren? A-and when his back was turned, the guy took a pistol and just, just, shot him… Shot him right in the back of the head!" He took a shaky breath, "W-well, I don't think I have to tell you that I stayed behind the crates after that, you know?"

"Could you describe this other Turian?" Arturia asked, eyes hard, and Powell instantly nodded.

"S-sure man. Um, though, most Turian's kinda look alike, so, not that well?" He said hesitantly, taking off his beanie for a moment to wipe the sweat off his head. "But I do know he was pretty pale, which I thought was kinda odd for a Turian, a-and his armor was pretty white as well. I could probably pick him out of a lineup if I really had to."

"What did he do after that?" Shirou asked, his fists clenched tightly. He never did well with betrayals, even if it was an enemy betraying another enemy.

"He jumped on the cargo train. Seemed like he was, uh, in a bit of a hurry after that, you know? Probably heading to the space port to get the cursed beacon." He said, his nervousness seeming to leave as it turned into anger, a bit of fire coming into his voice.

Shirou blinked in surprise, "Cursed?" He asked skeptically and a hint of nervousness. _Please let it not actually be cursed… Could the Protheans perform magecraft?_

Powell didn't seem to notice his nervousness, "Yeah cursed!" He exclaimed, "I knew that that thing was bad news the moment we found out about it! And then that mother ship came in, and everything went to crap! Heck, I don't know how they didn't even manage to find me!"

"Why didn't anybody else jump behind the crates with you?" Alenko jumped in, puzzled, and the guy flinched again.

"Uhm, well, you know, working around the garage and train is tough business, and the supervisor is a, well, _**was**_ a real hard case… So, sometimes I take a bit of time off for some quick z's." He explained tentatively, "It's the only way I can make it through the whole shift, and really I'm a lot more productive after it, so it all balances out, right? And so, well, I was already behind the crates when everything went down..." He finished, quickly rushing through the rest of his justification.

"You mean to tell me," Ashley whispered darkly after a few seconds of silence, "That you survived, while all of my squad was sacrificing themselves, because you were freaking LAZY!" The last coming out as a shout.

Powell flinched in the face of her anger, "Well what did you want me to do?" He asked desperately as Alenko and Jenkins gave disapproving glares. Arturia's face remained impassive, and he eventually settled on Shirou, who at least looked sympathetic. "Would it make you feel better if I had just died like everybody else?!"

Arturia laid a hand on Ashley's shoulder before she could go off again, and looked towards Shirou, nodding for him to continue.

"I'm glad that you had," he said in obvious relief, surprising all of them except for Arturia. "If you hadn't done that, you'd be dead like everybody else."

Powell deflated from his defensive stance and nodded jerkily.

"We need to head off soon, but is there anything that you can tell us about the attack?" Shirou asked hopefully, and the man shakily nodded again.

"Yeah, yeah, a little bit. That big mother ship woke me up when it first came down, that huge… Thing, gave out a sound, it just… resounded throughout my head, like it was trying to bore right through my brain!" He said quickly, his breath quickening as he recalled the event. "Then, then those machines came, thousands of them! And they just mowed everybody down, they didn't stand a chance."

The mother ship he talked about was undoubtedly the giant ship that was caught on the video that they had seen on the Normandy, but he wasn't sure what that noise would have been. A jamming signal perhaps?

Shirou looked at him in concern, "Do you need medical assistance?" He asked, "We can spare some med-gel before we leave if needed."

Powell shook his head, "N-no, I-I'll be fine and just, you know, wait here. They haven't found me yet, you know? A-and the Alliance should be here soon, right?" He asked, looking slightly reassured when they nodded.

Shirou still felt reluctant about just leaving him here, but couldn't think of a better plan. "Alright, stay here and stay quiet until other soldiers get here." He ordered, and the man looked further relieved and immediately ran to obey.

All of them were quiet as they started towards the cargo train. That quiet lasted only until they had gotten out of earshot.

Ashley turned towards them angrily, "We're just going to let him go?" She spat out, and Arturia looked towards her calmly.

"What would you have us do?" She asked, "At most, we could charge him with negligence, but that is NOT our responsibility at this time," she finished firmly.

Shirou spoke up next while walking up to her, "You're upset right now, and that's understandable," He stated gently, "But regardless of 'what' saved him, I'm just glad to see that at least 'somebody' was saved. And without him, we wouldn't have known who had killed Nihlus." He reminded her.

Ashley looked at him angrily for a few seconds before deflating, "Yeah, I guess you're right sir," She said reluctantly. "But his story is still suspicious. What if he had been lying?"

Arturia shrugged, "I didn't get the feeling that he was lying," She said in contemplation, "Though he was definitely hiding something." She turned to him and cocked her eyebrow, "Did you notice it?" She asked, and he nodded slowly.

"He felt guilty," He noted, "But I'm not sure about what. I had assumed it was guilt that he survived when nobody else had." _That was, after all, an experience that he was intimately familiar with._

He wasn't surprised that she had sensed that. As a King, reading people was a skill she would need to have to some degree.

"His guilt spiked when you were talking about the fighting, and when you offered him the medi-gel." She explained, "That meant he felt responsible to some degree. He didn't know about the attack though, so if I had to guess he knows something about either the equipment or supplies."

"Wait, really?" Jenkins exclaimed in surprise, looking at them with wide eyes. "But, then why didn't we question him some more?"

Arturia shrugged and gestured to the cargo train in front of them, "What would you have us do?" She repeated. "Furthermore, this is definitely the wrong time for that. Distraction is the enemy, and we had already spent longer than I'd like questioning him. There are still drones around, and if we wait any longer than we'll most likely be attacked."

With that, they readied their weapons, and Alenko looked at Ashley, "So this cargo train leads to the space port?"

"Yep. They were working to expand the colony, and they used the train to ferry supplies back and forth from the colony to here." She explained.

Alenko eyed the building with some misgiving before giving a big sigh, "Well, here we go again then," he said with some disgust.

* * *

The cargo train had been surprisingly easy to get to and activate.

There had been a couple of larger, heavy duty versions of the drones, but between Arturia and Alenko's biotics they were able to keep them down long enough for the other three to destroy them.

Now, as they were traveling towards the space port, Shirou couldn't help but keep a constant gaze at the tracks. Taking out the tracks behind oneself would be the ideal way of preventing people from following. And yet, they didn't seem to have been tampered with.

They saw the spaceport start to come into view, and Shirou took his eyes off the tracks to view it for a bit. It didn't appear to be a very large spaceport - Made of the same sleek material that the Alliance favored, he could see several ramps for large cargo, and several landing pads for transport ships nearby, though the ones currently in view all seemed empty.

What grabbed his attention soon after though was right besides the spaceport.

A large portion of what had used to be a highway and the ground around it had been turned into molten wasteland, not dissimilar to what a volcano looked like, the fires and smoke able to be seen from quite the distance. The highway itself had been completely melted, the twisted remains of the metal still glowing from the heat.

"My god," Ashley murmured, her face ashen. "That… looks like somebody let off a bomb there."

"Probably near where that mother ship Powell mentioned landed," Shirou stated softly with a pained look. "A ship that large would have more than enough room for some large weaponry."

As they got closer to the spaceport, Shirou felt his hands clench once more at the now familiar sight of numerous metal spikes and corpses. This time, however, the skin of the corpses was decidedly different, looking more like a regular person than the electric blue and black from before.

Perhaps these corpses had not spent enough time on the spikes to fully transform?

Their platform docked, and the first thing that Shirou noticed was a large, oblong device with wires that looked very much out of place, the material and design not matching the rest of the spaceport.

Dashing over to it, and with a sinking feeling in his stomach, he took off the plating and looked at the confusing mess of wires inside, gently touching the object and murmuring " _Structural Grasp"_ under his breath, pretending to study the inside as he activated his magic circuits and scanned the device.

It only took a few seconds for him to stiffen in panic, "Explosives!" He barked out, causing the others to pale. Before they could say anything, they had to duck as more drones appeared and started firing upon them.

"Art- Pendragon, you and Williams focus on taking out the rest of the drones," He ordered quickly, "Alenko, Jenkins, search the rest of the facility for any more explosives. I'll focus on disabling them"

He immediately focused on the bomb in front of him and did his best to ignore the sounds of gunfire behind him.

Arturia's dragon core might not be currently active, but it exuded just enough mana that he was able to recover from trying to catch up with her previously. He was still far from able to do everything that he used to, but using Structural Grasp was within his capabilities, so long as he used it sparingly.

The bomb was designed differently than he was used to, and a small part of him wondered which race designed it like this. But at their core, all explosives needed a trigger. Using his magic, he was able to swiftly find what and where the trigger was, and quickly disabled it.

His radio flared to life, and he heard Alenko speak up, "Found another one. Looks like they placed them at the support beams."

Arturia's voice then came over the line, "Several snipers and troopers on the western platform with the Beacon." She said calmly. "Ashley and I will take them out and secure it."

"Understood," Shirou replied, and quickly made his way to the bomb that Alenko had specified.

While the bombs might have been placed at the supports of the space port, they really didn't need to have been based on what he had Analyzed. The size of ONE explosion would have been bad enough, but to have multiple bombs of that size would combine to make a truly devastating explosion, and with the city as close as it was the loss of lives would not be small.

The shelters were not designed to withstand the force of something that was easily stronger than that of a nuclear bomb.

Working with both Alenko and Jenkins, he was able to locate the rest of the bombs fairly quickly, and after disabling the last bomb he finally relaxed and breathed a sigh of relief.

He turned to the two following him, "I think that that's it, but go ahead and do another search inside the building, just to be sure. Stick together, and call immediately if you find anything." He said, and they both gave a nod.

"Will do,sir" Kaiden replied, and the two moved out.

Shirou took a deep breath and let the stress flow out of him. Arturia and Ashley had secured the Beacon and taken out the majority of the enemy, and it sounded like Alenko and Jenkins had taken the rest out as they were searching for the bombs. The mission wasn't over yet, but it appeared that the difficult part was over.

With that, he started heading over to where he thought the communications room was. Now that things were calmer, and the jamming field was gone, establishing contact with the Normandy and the surviving marines in the area was the next most important task.

Until he heard something that shot that way down on his priority list.

"Commander!"

The sound of Ashley's distressed shout caused him to immediately change direction and run to where the two of them were without even thinking about it, all other thoughts leaving his mind at the panic in her voice.

Jumping over the rail onto the platform, he first saw Ashley, who looked like she had been thrown a fair distance. The second thing he saw then filled his vision, which turned red.

Arturia, his love, was floating in front of the Beacon, as if it had some sort of grip on her.

_No_

His bow was drawn without conscious thought.

_He would NOT allow it!_

He had used the majority of what little magic reserves he had to scan the bombs earlier, but he still threw as much as he could spare into Reinforcing this next arrow as best as he could, blue circuit lines crawling up the twisted arrow whose form was inspired by an Archer he knew in a previous life.

_He had just gotten her back, had just had to suffer as he watched her shield him from the enemy attacks. He REFUSED to allow this THING to take her away from him!_

The entire motion, from landing on the platform to releasing the arrow, happened in the span of a second. He felt a wave of exhaustion hit him as the prana was spent, the glowing arrow shot towards the tall, delicate looking Beacon like a comet.

Had he been watching, he would have noted how the Beacon seemed to explode before the arrow even impacted it, and yet his eyes were only for Arturia as he forced his body to move. He heard a voice shout something, only to realize it was his own.

He reached her just as her body fell to the deck, and he quickly activated her suit's medi-gel program, looking at her vitals through the various sensors of the suit.

The Beacon lay broken besides him, and yet he couldn't find it within him to care. It had hurt his love - as far as he was concerned, he was only sorry that it wasn't intact so he could break it once more.

Looking at her unconscious body he was filled with dread before he pushed it aside. The sensors said she wasn't injured, and he could clearly see that she was breathing, so he refused to believe that she was gone.

To lose her so soon after he had found her… He didn't know if he could handle it. He refused to let it happen.

He turned to Ashely, who was starting to stand up from where she was thrown, a look of horror on her face.

"Get to the communication room and contact the Normandy. Tell them that we've taken the space port, but we need immediate medical attention." He ordered, causing her to stiffen before she nodded, her face becoming more resolved now that she had something to do.

She hadn't even taken a step before he focused on Arturia once more, running through several medical scanning programs he had installed on his omni-tool.

 _Please be alright,_ he begged silently as he watched the results of the scan slowly start filtering through.

_Please don't leave me again._

* * *

_Arturia's POV_

Images flash before her eyes, too fast for her to fully make out. The sounds of battle, a twisted resounding boom, the grinding of metal on stone, screams…

Beneath it all was a pervasive sound of annoyed growling…

As her world went dark she heard Shirou's voice distantly shouting "Saber!", the panic and grief in it caused her to try harder to cling to consciousness longer, to reassure him, only to fall into the darkness.

Her dreams were filled with fractured images and thoughts, with very little making any sense. Giant machines destroying faceless armies, battleships rent in two falling from the sky, cities and towns falling into streams of fire, their citizens enslaved…

The dreams twisted, and the lands turned into Britain. It's villages and castles destroyed in a blink of an eye, her armies scattered and incinerated, their very lives mere motes of dust to the enemy. Britain, Camelot... She failed. Again and again she failed and failed, time and time again.

After an indiscernible amount of time being assaulted by the images she found herself on a clear patch of ground, exhausted, huddled next to a sleeping dragon that the machines seemed to actively avoid.

She took in a deep, shaky breath and leaned back, wearily observing the dreamlike images of destruction around them, doing her best to remind herself of the knowledge that she was not by herself this time.

She was no longer a King that stood alone. She had Shirou, her Sheath and her beloved, with her. This, all of it, need not happen.

She would not fail a second time.

Against her, the large sleeping dragon growled in annoyance of the dream, it's wing rising unconsciously to cover her while it's claws broke the earth beneath it.

* * *

_The Normandy_

_What a mess._

Anderson walked through the airlock of the Normandy with a sigh of relief. After the Geth (GETH!) had left, he was technically the most senior Alliance military officer left in the city, and as such there were numerous tasks that he needed to do.

Talking to the city officials, giving a report to both them and his superiors back on Arcturus Station, coordinating the containment of the… devices dubbed "Dragon's Teeth", the 'husks' of those infected, and the remains of the Geth, as well as working with the remaining military on the planet to help provide relief and protection until another Alliance vessel arrived.

Speaking of which, he made a mental note to talk to Colonel Krendle about assigning Williams to the Normandy. According to Emiya's report, she had provided valuable assistance to them, but when he had reported such to her superiors he hadn't liked the looks that they gave.

He'd make it temporary, he decided, until he figured out more of what was going on. He could request it under the excuse of her providing more of a protection detail as they brought the Beacon to the Citadel.

_The Beacon… or what was left of it anyways._

He grimaced as he thought of the second reason for his headache.

It would have been one thing had the Beacon been found ruined, or even taken. However, that they had found it intact, only for it to be destroyed soon after, would not look good. Especially since they had on record that Emiya had fired an unusually powerful shot at the thing.

Personally, Anderson could appreciate such an action, seeing as how it had been doing something to Arturia at the time. However, would the Council see it as such?

He doubted it.

The way it fell apart, he had been assured that it had not broken from the arrow, but because of other internal reasons. But seeing as how it had broken apart right after the arrow had hit it, he was skeptical that the Council would accept that. He was positive that a human court would not have.

He finished walking down the steps to the galley and sighed as he saw the last reason for his headache.

Her first mission under him, and little Arturia got put in a coma…

Ector was going to kill him for this. And depending on whether or not Kay was on a mission right now he'd probably assist.

Peeking into the medbay, he watched the still form of Arturia for a few moments. Dr. Chakwas wasn't hovering over her at the moment, and there didn't appear to be any panicking, so he was hopeful.

Turning to look at the mess hall table, he could see that Commander Emiya had commandeered one end of it, having set up multiple holo-screens and appeared to be working hard, dark shadows under his eyes.

The fact that that position allowed the Commander clear view of the medbay door was not lost on him.

Walking over to Emiya he coughed lightly, causing the red-head to jump in surprise.

"Oh, good evening Captain," he greeted before turning his attention back to one of the screens.

Anderson frowned, before giving a small chuckle, "More like good morning now," he replied, to which Emiya gave a blink at.

"Oh," He said in surprise, before shrugging and going back to working on whatever it was he was doing.

The captain watched him for a few moments before giving another sigh, "Did you get any sleep last night?"

The red head paused for a bit in thought before replying, "I think I nodded off for an hour and a bit," He said eventually, and Anderson looked at him disapprovingly before looking harder at the screens.

"What is it you're working so hard on?" He asked, frowning when a picture of Saren popped up on one of the screens.

Gesturing to it, "I'm trying to compile a search on the Turian that the dock worker described to us," He said absently. "Unfortunately, there's not much about him beyond basic information, and that he appears to be a Specter."

That didn't surprise Anderson in the least. The Specters were the elite of the Council itself. He doubted that many of their missions would ever drop from becoming 'Confidential'.

He thought about telling the Commander his experience with the Turian Specter, but looking at the dark shadows under his eyes made him hold his tongue. He would do so after the Commander got some rest.

He looked at another screen, "That doesn't look like a search," he said skeptically, and Emiya shook his head.

"THAT is an example of one of the Quarian coding languages." He explained, and Anderson looked at him in confusion before he explained, "All of the camera footage was corrupted by a Geth virus. They used a virus that I'm not familiar with, one that was in a different programming language. Since the Geth were created by the Quarians, I was hoping to get a feel for it. If I can get the uncorrupted footage, we might be able to piece together what they wanted with the Beacon."

Anderson blinked in surprise, _That wasn't that bad an idea,_ "Any luck?" He asked, and saw the Commander lower his head into his hands and rub his eyes tiredly.

"No, not yet," He muttered. "I've always been more hardware inclined, and the Quarians were masters at programming. Throw in that the Geth are fully evolved AI, it's highly probable that they made their own changes in the last several hundred years. I'm making progress, but it's slow. I've also sent some emails to a Quarian that I met a while ago, so hopefully he can answer some questions of mine."

 _Should have expected as much._ He thought in disappointment. He looked at the last holo screen, seeing what appeared to be a blueprint of some kind.

"And that one?" He asked, noting the colors of blue and gold amongst the formulas and dimensions.

Emiya stiffened and hesitated for a moment, "That's… a personal project," he eventually replied. "A bit of a hobby."

Anderson nodded at that. With as much work as he appeared to be doing, it was good that he had something to take his mind off of it.

He finally looked towards the medbay again. "Any word from Chakwas?" He asked, and noted as Emiya gave a quick look of longing towards the medbay.

"No, nothing new." He said softly, "She says that Art- I mean, Pendragon, doesn't seem to have anything wrong with her besides an increase in her dream patterns. She doesn't have an estimate on when she's going to wake up though."

He breathed out in disappointment. He had known that the situation was unlikely to have changed, but he still had hoped.

A part of him wanted to confront Emiya about what he had seen, about how he knew that the two of them were together… But with Arturia currently in a coma, it was hardly the best time to do so. He wanted answers, but he wasn't cruel.

Instead, he said "I've finished up everything I need to over here, so we'll begin traveling back to the Citadel within the hour," noting that he had Eimya's immediate attention after that.

"The Citadel?" He asked in confusion, "I thought we'd be heading back to Arcturus Station?"

"No," Anderson denied, "While it might be in pieces, the Council still might be able to do something with the remains of the Beacon. That, and if we want to accuse a Specter of treachery, then giving a report directly to the Council is the best way to go. And finally, if Arturia is still not awake by the time we get to the Citadel, then it has the best doctors in the Galaxy. We'll have one of them examine her and see what they say."

Emiya visibly relaxed at that, and Anderson gave a tired chuckle as he clapped him on the shoulder, "Go on and get some more rest," he ordered. "You'll want to be your best if you're going to be in front of the Council."

It took a few moments, but Emiya eventually shut his computers down and picked them up, giving one last glance at the medbay before nodding tiredly to the experienced Captain and walking off.

Anderson let himself relax as well and started going to his own quarters to take his own advice. With any luck, Arturia would awaken by the time they reached the Citadel. If not, he might have to ensure that his will was taken care of.

He should probably warn Udina as well. Ector was unlikely to stop at just him, and it would probably be bad for an Alliance Fleet to start chasing down the Specter's golden boy.

He shook his head to clear it. Now he knew he was tired if he was thinking this much hyperbole. He'd be infuriated, but Ector wouldn't go as far as to create that large a political incident.

His old friend wouldn't do that…

By the time he laid down on his bed he could almost convince himself of that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope everybody enjoyed this chapter. Not a lot happened that goes terribly different from canon, and I know that some people will be sad that I killed off Nihlus. The truth is, I wasn't sure how to keep him alive - my plan is to make changes in the story gradually, and I am going to strive to make sure that those changes make sense. They were able to save Jenkins because there were two of them working together, whereas Nihlus went off by himself. Furthermore, he trusted Saren, and allowed Saren to get close to him. That is what happened in the game, and there weren't enough differences in this story for that to change yet. Eventually however, there will be major canon divergence.
> 
> My plan is for Shirou and Arturia to fully regain the use of their magic by Mass Effect 2, and they'll stop hiding the use of said magic by Mass Effect 3. This is subject to change of course, but that is the plan.
> 
> Please let me know what you guys think. Also, let me know if you prefer long or short chapters. This is probably the longest chapter that I have written, but I wasn't sure if I should cut it in half or not and post sooner. I hadn't intended to make it this long, but I had planned on finishing Eden Prime in one chapter, and it ended up just growing until it got to what you see now.
> 
> I give credit to my brother, Autumnstar, and my sisters, Elronia and CaptainDarkElf, for peer reviewing and giving suggestions for this chapter, and would like to thank them for their help. Talk to you later!


	6. Citadel Arrival

_The Normandy - Storage_

_*Click* *Click-Clack* *Schtic*_

The sound of a gun being disassembled and reassembled rapidly drifted through the air of the cargo bay, echoing through the large area filled with vehicles and tools.

At a work table, Ashely Williams sat while focusing on the gun in front of her, trying to distract her mind from the depressing thoughts that plagued her.

_*Clickety-Clack*_

In the corner of the cargo bay was the remains of the Prothean Beacon, the stupid artifact that brought such a large change to her life.

The deaths of her friends and coworkers, the many civilians who didn't even know the device existed, and for putting Commander Pendragon in a coma.

_*Chuchack!*_

She slammed the final piece in position with more force than necessary, an undercurrent of guilt running through her.

She couldn't help but feel somewhat responsible for that last one.

Logically, she knew that it wasn't her fault...

It _wasn't._

They had cleared the area of those drones methodically and quickly and had been holding the area down as they listened to the other Commander (And that still confused her - why have two commanders on a mission? Would that not just breed confusion?) give updates on disarming the bombs while the other two - The Corporal and Lieutenant - continued to clear the area.

She had been morbidly curious about the delicate looking Beacon. It was active, which it had most assuredly NOT been when she had last seen it, so the drones and that Turian must have done something to it.

That should have been her first indication that something was off.

She had been tense and on guard - the others were still taking out drones after all, and there was the matter of the bombs - but as she walked closer to observe the Beacon she hadn't expected to be yanked towards it.

She had fought spars against biotics, and this felt just like that. She hated it then, and she hated it even more _now._ The feeling of panic and helplessness, knowing there was nothing she could do no matter how much she struggled… she couldn't even _scream._

It had startled her when something suddenly yanked on her arm, sending her flying in the opposite direction. Looking up, she saw the Commander levitating in the air in front of the Beacon, clearly having taken her place.

She didn't know what to do for the first freakin' time in her career. Years of training, of proving that she WAS good enough, and she couldn't figure out what to do! There was nothing obvious to shoot, she didn't have any biotics to attempt, and if she got closer than both of them might be trapped.

And yet she couldn't just do _nothing!_

She was so focused on Commander Pendragon that she completely missed when the other Commander arrived, had barely even seen the blur of the arrow he shot when the Beacon had exploded. Before she could move he was suddenly _there,_ catching the Pendragon before she hit the ground.

Thinking of both the Commanders had her wincing once more, and she put her gun down and kneaded her temples with her fingers.

It hadn't been her fault - they had no way of knowing that the Beacon would react in such a way after all. And yet that did nothing to assuage the guilt within her. Especially since, well…

Ashley felt her cheeks heat up slightly.

She hadn't realized that Pendragon and Emiya were together.

They certainly hadn't acted like it, besides with how well they seemed to work together. Then again, it's not like she expected them to flirt while they were on a mission, and she had only known them since earlier that day. Maybe they acted like a normal couple outside of missions?

If it hadn't been for the look that Emiya had given the unconscious Commander as he held her she wouldn't have even guessed. A look that she had previously only seen on her father's face when her mother was sick.

In the short time that she had known him during that mission, she had seen Emiya show concern, anger, and encouragement, in addition to the neutrality he had while fighting. But the look that he had while holding Pendragon was so much deeper - panic, desperation, and tenderness, all wrapped into one.

The name Emiya called Pendragon - 'Saber' - Maybe a call sign from a previous mission together? It certainly hadn't been in use during Eden Prime. Still, it was another indication that they were close as far as she was concerned.

Of course, knowing that just made her feel even more guilty. Not only was one Commander in a coma because of her actions, but another was hurting because of them as well.

Illogical perhaps, but… was it wrong?

She let out a sigh and was about to start cleaning another gun when she heard the elevator rumble. She looked up just in time to see it open and reveal the two others that had accompanied the Commanders, Alenko and Jenkins.

Great.

She hadn't talked to many people since coming on board. She had been debriefed by the Captain before he had to go talk to the leaders of the settlement, and had briefly talked with Pressly and the doctor, but had sequestered herself right after that in the cargo bay to 'guard' the remains of the Beacon.

Not that it needed any guarding of course - whatever the Commander used in that arrow had really done a number on the thing. Still, it gave her an excuse to be alone.

"Chief," greeted Alenko, "Haven't seen you since we got back from Eden Prime. How's the Normandy been treating you?"

_Maybe because I didn't want to be seen._ She thought with annoyance. Instead, she shrugged, "It's alright." She stated indifferently as she picked up her rifle and started taking it apart. "Better than being planet-side I suppose."

Her reply caused the Corporal to give her a look of surprise, "Just okay?" He asked incredulously, walking over and plopping himself down on a nearby crate, "The Normandy is the most advanced ship in both the Human AND Turian Navy's! The entire crew is amongst the best that humanity has to offer, and that now includes you! That's gotta be better than 'ok', don't you think?"

She kept her focus entirely on dismantling her gun. "I go where I'm ordered to go," She stated dismissively. "I was ordered to join this crew, so here I am."

That was a lie. In truth, this was practically a dream come true. For years she had been asking for a ship assignment, constantly rejected time after time despite her qualifications. Any other time, being assigned to the Normandy would be cause for celebration. But now…

Alenko coughed awkwardly, "Still, it's gotta be rough to go through all this change, especially with, well, everything that happened down there."

… Yeah. That.

The younger man, Jenkins, joined Alenko in how awkward he looked, "Ah, yeah, I guess that would do it." His voice becoming more subdued, "I know how you feel. I mean, I grew up down there, you know? My family wasn't in that area, but I used to have friends that were around there." He looked down. "I haven't asked about who survived. Kinda worried about what I'll learn. It might have been a while since I've hung out with them, but they were still my friends, you know?"

She didn't say anything, though she had to practically lock her jaw in place to do so. She was afraid that she would snap at him, and if she was going to be working with them in the near future then silence would be the better route.

Sergeant Donkey… Bates… Rasputin... Her mind flashed through her squad and the people she had spent the most time with. They might have been aggravating at times, more annoying than not, but they were her friends. All of them, dead, only to be transformed into those… things - just _husks_ of their former selves.

And she had given many of them a second death.

How could he know how she felt? They might have aggravated her, but these were people that she had worked with for _years._

Of course, that would have been bad enough, yet then when things had finally seemed over Commander Pendragon had been struck down. Because of her.

This might have been the post that she wanted, but at what cost?

_And guilt is worse than slow poison,_

_everyday it haunts the guilty person._

_Until you clear your blunder,_

_each day it makes you ponder..._

She hadn't understood the poem till now. Though she was truly at a loss as to how to 'clear' this.

Not that she would ever admit her true thoughts. As morose as she was feeling, she was well aware that if they realized that she was having problems they might take her off duty, and her chance at ship duty would be gone forever.

Instead, she took a deep breath and with forced calm replied, "They gave their lives to help protect the settlement. With what we were up against, it was pure luck that I managed to survive. And, well, I have no intention of disrespecting their sacrifice by regretting what happened."

Maybe if she told herself that enough she'd start to believe it.

Before they could ask anything else she tried to distract them with another question, one that she was genuinely curious about.

"Is there any news about Commander Pendragon yet?" She asked, finally looking up from dismantling her gun. It had been a full day since the end of the mission, but nobody but engineers had come down thus far so she hadn't heard any updates.

Alenko shook his head with a sigh, "No, not really. But Doctor Chakwas is highly qualified. I don't know if she would be considered the 'best', like Jenkins said, but she's probably in the top ten. The Commander is definitely in good hands."

Jenkins gave a little laugh, his glum mood shedding as he sent a mischievous look towards the biotic user, "He's all calm now, but you should have seen him a few hours ago, all freaked out 'cause his crush still hadn't woken up yet." He said with a smirk, only to receive a tired scowl from the Major.

"What are you, twelve?" He grumbled as he leaned against the wall, "I told you, that was a long time ago."

Ashley raised her eyebrow. It might have been years ago, but apparently that didn't stop him from blushing.

Jenkins leaned back on the crate, crossing his legs smugly, "I don't see why you're embarrassed about it. I mean, I think almost every guy on this ship has the same thoughts," He smirked, "Probably even a few women. Right Chief?" He turned his attention towards her once more and she snorted, turning away from him.

"I'm afraid that my romantic inclinations aren't any of your business." She retorted without any heat, feeling a tinge of nostalgia. His questions and attitude reminded her of Donkey.

Jenkins shrugged, "Eh, true," He admitted. "Not that it matters now."

_Right, because the Commanders were -_

"Seeing as how she and that Turian Specter were dating." Jenkins finished, causing Ashley to pause in her work, not comprehending that sentence for a moment as it mulled over in her mind.

"She was dating the... Specter?" She asked in confusion.

He looked at her for a second before widening his eyes, "Oh, that's right, you wouldn't have heard!" He realized, "Well, before the mission, Captain Anderson and the Specter were having a meeting with the Commanders, and after both of the Commander's had left the Spectre was talking with the Captain about some stuff. Right when the Spectre was leaving, everybody on the main deck heard him tell the Captain that he was going to take Pendragon out on a date afterwards." He winced, "But then he, uh… you know. Down there..."

He looked relieved when Alenko sighed, "We don't know that that's true," He stated in a tired voice, "I told you, the Commander hasn't shown any interest in dating the entire time that I've known her."

"Well yeah," came the unconcerned reply, "She hasn't shown any interest in anybody ' _cause she was already dating somebody_!"

Ashley didn't want to think badly of the dead, but the idea of the Commander and a Turian going out… Didn't sit right with her. _We're two different species, how does that even -_

Nope. She stopped that train of thought quickly. That wasn't any of her business, and she had no desire to learn that level of alien biology. And furthermore, it completely clashed with what she had already concluded about the Commander's.

She thought back to the mission, to when they had first found the body of the Turian, turning the image through her head…

She couldn't see it.

She didn't expect the Commander to break down or anything, but she would have thought that her composure would have broken at least a little bit if she had feelings for him! The entire time she had remained completely in control, managing to keep everybody else on track at the same time.

"I don't know," both eyes looked at Ashley as she spoke up slowly, looking between the two of them, "I thought that maybe Pendragon and Emiya had a thing going."

It was possible that Emiya liked her, and that the feeling wasn't mutual. But at the very least, she was - almost - positive that Pendragon didn't have feelings for the Turian.

Jenkins cocked his head slightly in thought, "Eh, I don't know," He said doubtfully, "I don't really see it. They didn't really act like it."

"Oh, and Pendragon and Nihlus did?" Alenko asked, snorting in amusement.

"Well, we didn't have the chance to see anything before Nihlus went off on his own." Jenkins rebutted easily.

Alenko shook his head, "Look, I've known Pendragon for years, and she's never shown any interest in romance." He repeated firmly, "I mean, whenever we asked she would tell us that she had a 'boyfriend', but she never gave us any details about him, so we're pretty sure that it was just an excuse to get guys to stop asking her."

"Oooor, she didn't want it known that one of humanity's finest was dating a Turian!" Jenkins cut in with a victorious smirk, proud at finding another 'point' that proved his theory.

Ashley rolled her eyes and went back to putting her rifle back together as the guys started going back and forth, seemingly dismissing her idea.

Maybe she was wrong, but she was going to go with her gut on this one. And if they were having a relationship in secret… Well, it wasn't like it was her business to tell anybody. Especially after Pendragon saved her.

She didn't even realize, sitting next to the two as they argued about gossip, for the first time since leaving Eden Prime the feelings of guilt were slowly dissipating.

* * *

_Arturia's POV_

The scent of antiseptic and medi-gel was the first thing that she registered, the smell almost causing her to groan purely out of instinct.

The infirmary… She was a lot more familiar with the place than she'd like to be.

Arturia quickly cataloged her aches and pains, determining after a few seconds that she only had a headache and slight nausea, which was better than the broken bones that Chakwas would scold her for. With that determined she forced the pain to the side, slowly opening her eyes and attempting to move herself upright. Before she could do so though, she felt another presence by her side.

"Saber? Arturia? Are you alright?" Hearing Shirou's voice, her body relaxed slightly in response.

It hadn't been a dream.

She had lost count of the number of times she had dreamt of Shirou finally meeting her at Avalon, or reuniting with him somewhere in this second life, only for her to wake up to find herself alone once more. Unfortunately, with the knowledge that he was indeed with her reaffirmed, the rest of the day came back to her - the mission, the army of drones, the Spectre's death, and ending with the Beacon.

The memories of the dreams that came after made her wince, and she attempted to hide the action by making to move off the bed when Shirou was suddenly in front of her, pushing her back down.

"Don't get up just yet," He cautioned in a firm voice, "You've just barely woken up, and the doctor will want to look at you before you do anything."

This time she did wince, glaring slightly at him while ignoring the headache and nausea. Though she could admit the medbays of the present were amazing compared to medieval times (the removal of leeches from medical practices was especially welcoming) it was still primarily a place for the sick and dying. Of which she was neither.

"I'm perfectly capable of -"

"Please," Shirou interrupted her, and she blinked in surprise at his tone. Worry of course, but also traces of fear and desperation, her own heart tensing in response. Did somebody die on the mission?

She leaned back and looked at him carefully, "Did everybody make it back alright? Was Chief Williams hurt?" She asked cautiously, seeing something in his expression for an instant before it disappeared.

"... No, everybody made it out alright. There were no more bombs, and Ashley was fine. But I…" He took a shuddering breath, moving a slightly shaking hand up to run through her hair, "I nearly lost you."

… _Oh._

Those words, spoken in whispers, were enough to make all of her irritation melt as she berated herself. She should have realized - It's what she would do were their situations reversed.

They had yet to be reunited for a full day and whatever that Beacon had done could have separated them once more.

"I just barely found you," He continued, haunted amber eyes looking into her own worried emerald, "I can't lose you again. _I can't._ Not now."

She reached up and grasped his hand in hers, lacing her fingers with her beloved as she gently ran her thumb across it to stop the shaking, "I'm fine." She assured him firmly, yielding slightly to his doubtful look, "I have a small headache," she admitted, "but I have no other wounds beyond that. I'm not going to leave you."

He stared at her in doubt for a moment before seemingly accepting her words and relaxing, his thumb mirroring her own. It was obvious to her that he needed the confirmation that she was alright, something that she had no problem giving. Similarly she relished the opportunity - a part of her still in disbelief that they were together after so long, their reunion the day prior being far too short for her own liking, and she took comfort from the warmth and texture of his hands. They remained like that for several minutes, simply enjoying the presence of each other, before she reluctantly broke the silence.

"What happened after I was knocked unconscious?"

The next several minutes were spent listening intently as Shirou went over everything. It hadn't been much - the arrival of the Normandy and other reinforcements, Captain Anderson reassigning Chief Williams to their crew, and what they had learned about the enemy. During all this, she noticed that he continued to keep in contact with her. Not that she was complaining.

"So, Geth?" She mused softly, accepting a small drink of water that Shirou had given her, "I don't think I've heard a lot about them."

"That's not too surprising," Shirou admitted, "They've stayed behind the Perseus Veil for several centuries, ever since the Quarians were exiled. Officially, they stay on their side, and we stay on ours."

She raised an eyebrow at him, "Officially?"

He gave her a small shrug, "They're a force powerful enough to exile an entire species from their system, and the relays make them only a few jumps away from civilized space." He explained dryly, "I would be quite surprised if, well, _any_ of the species capable of it would leave them be without some sort of investigation."

Arturia nodded in understanding. It made sense, and would be what she would have done. "And I suppose the prize of a Prothean relic would be a boon for even AI," she admitted thoughtfully, "Though it bothers me that they were able to mobilize their forces as quickly as they did."

That a Prothean Beacon had been found had been kept secret even from them till they had nearly arrived on Eden Prime. That the Geth had learned about it and were able to send such a large force so quickly meant that they not only had access to confidential information, but were also keeping a small army on standby and relatively close to civilized space. Both thoughts were far from comforting.

"We're too far aware for them to be able to invade with so many as quickly as they did." He agreed, "And they weren't interested in actually taking the Beacon - the ones we fought at the spaceport were left behind to make sure the bombs went off, and according to Ashley they didn't show any signs of attempting to move the Beacon."

She understood the implications, "They already got what they needed from it." She concluded grimly. "For them to do so while they were still on the planet means there was a good chance they knew exactly what they wanted and how to get it, despite not even US knowing what was on it."

They thought about that for several moments in silence till their privacy was suddenly broken with the sound of the door activating. She felt her eye twitch in irritation as she let go of Shirou's hand, seeing the tinge of regret in his own as he straightened and put some distance between them.

Honestly, they needed to start establishing their 'relationship' soon. She might have understood the necessity of it, but that didn't mean she liked it. She had done her duty, had even taken upon herself more responsibility in this new life, and was finally presented with the happiness she desired. She had waited far too long as it was.

A moment later and Dr. Chakwas was walking in, the stern doctor's lips curving upward slightly as she saw Arturia awake.

"Ah, Commander. It's good to see you awake. You had us worried there." Her smile, slight as it was, disappeared as she fixed a disapproving glare on Shirou, "I thought I had the door locked to prevent anybody from disturbing the Commander?" She questioned with a glare.

Arturia watched in amusement as Shirou gave an apologetic shrug, "The door opened easily enough, so I didn't think much of it. I just wanted to check up on Commander Pendragon." He gave a slight bow, "I apologize for disturbing your area," He stated contritely.

' _The door opened easily enough…'_ She didn't roll her eyes, but it was a near thing. Instead, she eyed his omni-tool curiously. How good must he be if he could hack the locks of a state of the art ship like the Normandy?

Chakwas looked at him sternly before going over to some medical tools and bringing out an omni tool, scanning Arturia's body with it. "Well, I suppose I can't fault you for that." She allowed before addressing Arturia, "Now then, whatever happened managed to knock you out for more than a day, which is quite concerning as we were unable to find a reason for it." She looked up from her scan and Arturia could see the thinly hidden concern in her gaze, "How are you feeling?"

Arturia breathed out slowly and focused on her body for a moment, "I have a minor headache," She reported, sitting up more and swinging her legs off of the uncomfortable bed, very much aware of and ignoring Shirou's concerned/disapproving eyes on her. "Other than that, I feel perfectly fine."

"I see." The doctor murmured while she worked, "While you were unconscious, we noticed some unusual brain activity. Abnormal beta waves, which would explain the headache. Additionally, there was an increase in rapid eye movement, indicative of intense dreams. Other than that, every test indicated that you were fine."

The reminder caused Arturia to frown, "Yes, I remember the dreams… No, nightmares," She murmured absently, shuddering at the images that flashed through her mind, "A very vivid set of nightmares."

Destruction. Entire cities being razed. Camelot burning, her knights and their lands being destroyed, all caused by some kind of synthetics. Geth perhaps? She didn't know much about the advanced AI created by the Quarians, but it was possible. The dreams might have been disjointed, but that did nothing to detract from the fear and horror that she felt from it. And unlike normal dreams, these had a quality to them that made them more substantial, more _real_ \- much like the dreams that she had had of Shirou and her previous life before she had fully remembered.

She shuddered once more while Chakwas made another note on her clipboard.

This train of thought made her realize that Shirou hadn't mentioned something in his brief summary.

"What happened to the Beacon? Were we able to retrieve it?"

Just before she fell unconscious she remembered an explosion of some sort, but hopefully the device was still intact. It had apparently survived since the Prothean Empire, so she would expect them to be reasonably durable.

Shirou shrugged lightly, "I determined that the device was malfunctioning, clearly putting an Officer of the Alliance at risk. Therefore, I blew it up." He responded, his tone calm and clinical, as if what he had done had been the most reasonable course of action.

… _Clearly not durable enough._

Arturia felt her heart stutter, slowly turning to stare at him, "... You what?"

She didn't particularly care for the Beacon itself, but she could appreciate it's potential strategic and scientific value. It was clear that the Captain and the Spectre placed a good deal of importance on it, and surely the Council would think the same.

He remained unconcerned, clearly unrepentant even under her gaze, and she could see the firm resolution in his gaze. "I shot at it, and it blew up."

"Indeed he did. Our best guess is that his shot caused a system overload, resulting in the explosion and subsequent destruction of the Beacon."

All three people turned their eyes to the entrance of the med bay to see Captain Anderson walk in, clearly exhausted.

"Hello Captain," greeted Doctor Chakwas, to which he returned easily.

"So how's our Commander holding up Doctor?" He asked, looking at her in concern, motioning her to sit back down when she moved to stand at attention, something that she reluctantly complied with.

"I'm feeling fine," she stated in an annoyed tone before the doctor could reply, "Whatever happened, it appears a good rest took care of it."

Doctor Chakwas simply raised her eyebrow at her, "While I disagree with the Commander's blaise attitude, she is essentially correct," She replied dryly, "All of the readings appear normal, and since the Commander is now up and about, I think she'll be just fine. Though I would still appreciate some more advanced neurological tests at the Citadel - the fact that she was out for a full day is extremely concerning."

Arturia gave a look of betrayal at the doctor, and she just knew that Shirou would push for and agree with everything Chakwas said.

Anderson gave a weary chuckle, "Well, at least you ARE up. We were starting to worry."

She flushed at the concern, "So I heard."

It was irritating at times, but Anderson could often be as protective as Ector when he wanted to be. Not that that was a bad thing per se, but it did get aggravating when she felt that it was unwarranted.

"Anyways," The Captain continued, "I was hoping to talk to the Commander in private if I could. Both Commanders."

Chakwas looked at him for a second before nodding, "Very well. I'll be in the mess hall looking over these results." Picking up her stuff, she gave a quick nod to both her and Shirou before leaving the two of them with the Captain.

As soon as she left, Shirou coughed in embarrassment, still standing at attention, "Sir, I'd like to apologize for the way I spoke to you last night. It was unprofessional, and I -"

Anderson lifted up a hand, cutting Shirou off with a weary chuckle, "No need to apologize," He assured Shirou, his lips twitching in tired amusement, "It was clear that you had been working without rest ever since getting back from the mission. Since you were concerned about your fellow Commander, I think it'll be fine if I let it slide this once."

Arturia looked at Shirou with suspicion, which he actively avoided looking into. She would need to corner him later about that...

"No, I wanted to talk to you two about the mission itself."

Both gave him their immediate attention.

He sighed, looking more frustrated than she had ever seen him, "I won't lie to either of you, things look bad. Nihlus is dead, and the Beacon is destroyed by our own hands. The Council and the Alliance are both going to want answers."

Shirou remained at attention, "Respectfully sir, I apologize for the trouble my actions caused, but I don't regret them," his tone firm, and not at all apologetic.

She had to prevent herself from wincing at his bluntness. Honestly, they were trying to _hide_ their relationship! She felt relieved when Anderson gave a weary chuckle, somehow not noticing how possessive Shirou's words were.

"I wasn't expecting you to," He admitted, "But regardless of how much I might approve of your actions, they still have consequences. Seeing as how we have, on record, that you destroyed priceless Prothean technology? Well, that's the sort of thing that will get you noticed."

"The situation had changed." Arturia interjected with hard eyes as she quickly formulated an argument, "We were equipped and prepared for a retrieval mission, and were dropped into a battle zone with an opponent of unknown capabilities, numbers, and equipment. When Commander Emiya arrived it was to see an unknown device physically restraining me." Her eyes narrowed dangerously, "His actions could have very well saved my life. If anything, I was in the wrong for not establishing proper distance between the device and Chief Williams and myself. I do hope that that is being taken into consideration."

She wasn't too worried about whatever punishment he might suffer - if he were demoted or reassigned she would simply use her position and connections to request him to her team. She would NOT let herself be separated now - No, instead, she was worried for his honor. She was, first and foremost, a Knight, and for somebody to call in question her honor was an insult of the highest order. She knew that Shirou didn't care about how others saw him, but SHE definitely cared.

Just as he was her Sheath, she was his Sword. An attack against his honor was an attack on hers.

Thankfully, Anderson nodded in agreement, "I agree with you, and I'll be standing behind the two of you on that. Unfortunately, it's not quite so simple." He grimaced, "It has to do with the other turian that your witness observed. Saren."

Arturia's expression turned curious as Shirou's narrowed in thought.

"I tried to look into him, but wasn't able to find much." The red head admitted thoughtfully. "I found numerous hits with that name, but the only one that matched the meager description that Powell gave us was Saren Arterius - another Spectre. Unfortunately there wasn't much on him."

Anderson gave a huff, "You just don't have enough clearance," He responded wryly before his expression turned darker. "But you're right. Saren is a Spectre, like Nihlus was. But just saying that doesn't give him enough credit. He's one of the best, a living legend. But if he's working with the Geth, it means he's gone rogue." He looked at both of them, "A rogue Spectre would be dangerous enough, but Saren is in a league of his own, and he hates humans."

Arturia found herself frowning. As a King, reading people had become a necessity, but even if she hadn't been she doubted she would have missed the anger in his voice. Her Uncle had past experience with this Spectre.

She would need to talk to him about it later, "And you believe that he hates humanity enough to commit treason and mass murder?" She asked skeptically, "It's one thing to hate somebody, but quite another to truly act on it, especially in a position such as his."

Then again, some people truly did have enough hatred to commit acts of hatred no matter how irrational it was. Morgana was a prime example of such.

A thought hit her, "And why would the Geth be working with him? I hardly think that they would work with Saren just to destroy humanity."

She could understand if the lure of the Beacon is what drew in the reclusive AI, but why would they need to work with a Turian for that? It was clear that the Geth provided the manpower in this relationship based on what they saw on Eden Prime, but what could he offer? His connection to classified data perhaps? But that would then go back to Saren harming not only the Systems Alliance, but committing multiple levels of treason against the Council and his own species. Did his hatred truly extend that far?

Something wasn't right. They were missing a piece of the puzzle.

Anderson shrugged, "Maybe he offered them access to the Beacon?" He suggested, "Or some other information. As a Spectre, who knows what that could be. Regardless of how or why, we know that he is working with the Geth, and they now have whatever was in the Beacon."

He turned to her with an intense look, "You were there just before the beacon was destroyed. Did you see anything? Any clue that might tell us what Saren was after?"

She didn't even need to think about that - she remembered exactly what she saw at that moment, "Just before I lost consciousness, I did see… something." She admitted reluctantly, thinking back to it once more. "Images, almost like a vision."

Almost. Merlin had often taught her in her dreams, and those could be called visions. She supposed there were some similarities between the two. Merlin had enjoyed being enigmatic and confusing, but his visions had never caused any pain beyond the headache of trying to figure it out.

"A vision? He repeated, "A vision of what?"

She stayed silent for a few seconds, trying to figure what she could tell that would make sense. "There were synthetics. Maybe Geth, maybe something else.." _They didn't look like the drones on Eden Prime, but they were machines. Changing what their bodies looked like was within their capabilities._ "They were slaughtering people. Going through, destroying everything…"

It started with the vision, which then bled into dream. Realistic enough to cause her grief, and easily enough to bring to mind the first fall of Camelot.

She didn't know when, but Shirou seemed to have moved closer, an anchoring presence for her, while Anderson nodded, looking even more determined, "We need to report this to the Council."

Arturia looked at him skeptically, "And what will we say?" She asked sternly, "that I had a bad dream?"

She was well aware how that would turn out. If a knight-commander or lord had come to her and reported that they had had a prophetic dream of destruction, she would have been... Skeptical, to say the least, and she had been aware of magic. At least she could turn the matter over to Merlin and let him handle it. Here, the Council would have no such recourse.

"You don't believe that this was just a dream," came Shirou's voice.

"No," She acknowledged, "But that's hardly going to persuade the Council."

Her statement did little to dissuade Anderson, "Perhaps not, but for something like this? We need to push with everything we've got."

"Then we'll look for something else," She countered, "Doing all of this, working with the Geth, that's hardly something he could arrange overnight. It would require meetings, deals, communication… All of which he wouldn't be able to do without leaving some sort of evidence. Surely if the Council were to investigate they would find something."

There had been nobles who sold out to the Saxons. Sometimes for money, other times for the chance to increase their own lands. Rooting out those plots had been difficult, but still possible based on various factors and the assistance of Agravain on her side. Though there were times it was difficult to determine whether certain actions were done due to betrayal or merely stupidity...

In the current era of information though, she would think it would be even harder to cover one's tracks.

She raised an eyebrow as Anderson immediately shook his head. "The Council gives Spectre's a great deal of autonomy, and if anybody is trained in erasing their traces, it would be him." He stated firmly.

He saw their unconvinced expressions and sighed, "Look, we don't know what information was stored in that beacon. Lost Prothean Technology? Blueprints for some ancient weapon of mass destruction? Whatever it was, Saren now has it, and what you saw might be the key to figuring out what it was." He started to pace restlessly, "I know you might find it hard to believe that anybody would go to such extremes…"

_No,_ Arturia couldn't help but disagree internally. It wasn't hard to believe that of somebody at all…

"… But I know Saren." Anderson continued, "I know his reputation, his politics. He believes humans are a blight on the galaxy. This attack was an act of war! He has the secrets from the beacon. He has an army of Geth at his command. And he won't stop until he's wiped humanity from the face of the galaxy!"

Arturia stared at him unwaveringly for a few seconds before inclining her head slightly, "If you believe it will help, then very well." She allowed, and she saw Shirou nod along with her, "You know the Council, and Saren, better than either of us." She looked at him questioningly, "What exactly is your relationship with Saren?" She asked, her tone soft yet firm, the unexpected question seemingly derailing the furious Captain. "You said you knew him," She pointed out, "And based on what you were saying it was hardly a pleasant occurrence."

While his decisions were often considered brash and impulsive, her Father had always claimed that Anderson was able to keep a level head when it counted. Right now though, he wasn't showing that side of him. Oh, his conclusion was a possibility, but... it was quite the leap to go from 'Saren attacked a human colony' to 'Saren intends to destroy humanity'.

Still, based on what happened at Eden Prime, she would readily agree that he needed to be stopped.

She saw a flicker of grief in his eyes before he shook his head, "That…" He let out a breath, "That'll have to be a story for another time. We're nearing the Citadel now. I've messaged the Ambassador, and he's going to try to get us an appointment with the Council. As a Spectre, Saren has their trust, and with that he's practically untouchable. But if we want to get anywhere with this, we'll need them on our side."

"And if they don't believe us?" Shirou asked, and Arturia wordlessly agreed. They had the word of one dockworker against somebody that the Council probably knew personally.

The Captain shrugged, "We'll deal with that hurdle when we reach it." He glanced at his omnitool, "But right now I recommend that you two get ready, I need to prepare a few things before we dock."

He made to head out the door when he paused and looked back at Arturia with a smile, "I'm glad you're okay Arturia. Your father and brother would have had my head had anything happened to you under my watch."

She gave a small smile. Whatever his faults, he was still an Uncle in all but blood, and a good man besides that. She could only hope that he would keep a level head during the meeting with the Council.

"I think you're worrying too much," She replied with humor, "I'm a soldier, as are my brother and father. Kay and Ector may not have liked it, but I'm sure they would understand."

He shook his head with a snort while muttering something under his breath that she missed before walking out, leaving her alone in the med bay with Shirou once more.

She felt him sidle against her, and she allowed herself to relax against him for a moment, taking advantage of their momentary privacy. "You didn't say much during all of that," She noted curiously, "I would have thought you'd be the one pushing for action."

She felt his chuckle as much as she heard it, "When I was younger I probably would have," He admitted with a smile before his tone turned slightly bitter, "I've… learned to get all the information if possible before acting."

She frowned as she turned her head to look at him and he was quick to give her a reassuring smile, "It was a long time ago," He stated dismissively, his lips twitching upwards for a moment, "A _really_ long time ago technically, and Rin made sure to give me one of her patented lectures after that whole debacle." He gave an exaggerated wince at that, successfully getting her to chuckle at the memory of the assertive young magus.

"Had we seen Saren - or anybody else that looked like they were responsible for what happened - then I'd probably have done exactly what you're thinking of to make sure that they were stopped." He admitted easily, "Right now though, there's nothing we can do for it."

She nodded in approval, making a mental note to ask him for that story later.

Her list of things to talk to Shirou about was growing quite long. So much had happened to him while she waited, and while her beloved was still the same person that she had first known and fallen in love with, there was now so much about him that she didn't know, and she was looking forward to learning.

For now though, "So what do you think about all of this?"

"With Saren?" Shirou remained silent for several moments before replying, "For somebody that hates humanity, Saren didn't really go for the maximum amount of death on Eden Prime." He murmured, confirming her own thoughts. "Considering the size and strength of the flagship, he could have done a lot more. Instead, it looks like he focused solely on the area around the Beacon - first acquiring it, and then defending it." He shrugged, slightly jostling her, "Of course, he might just be playing the long game if there were blueprints to a weapon or something on the Beacon, like the Captain thinks, but…" He trailed off, and Arturia hummed in acknowledgement.

He **might** be playing the long game… **If** there were blueprints... There were too many unknowns. Ignorance was the enemy, one that was particularly troublesome.

She groaned slightly before standing and exiting the comfort of Shirou's presence. "I suppose I need to make an appearance in front of the rest of the crew." She said with obvious reluctance.

To be out for a full day meant that there was a full 24 hours worth of rumors now circulating, something that remained constant no matter the year. It would be better for the crew to see her out and about before they docked.

Thankfully Shirou didn't insist she rest some more, instead walking with her to the door. Before they opened the door Shirou reached out and touched her shoulder, surprising her by leaning in and giving her a gentle kiss when she looked at him.

"I know it goes without saying," He said quietly when the kiss ended, touching his forehead to her own and she felt herself blushing despite herself from both the kiss and the proximity, "But I'm also very grateful that you are alright. Saren should consider himself very lucky that you weren't injured." His golden eyes flashed dangerously at that before calming once more, piercing her own with their intensity and taking her breath away. "I don't know what I would do if I lost you again."

Staring, Arturia had to give her thoughts a mental shake before she could reply, "So long as it is within my power, I shall not leave you. This I swear." She promised solemnly before looking at him with narrowed eyes, an image of him jumping in front of her to block a strike from Berserker, "This goes for you as well. I will be most… Displeased if you were to fall."

He said nothing for a moment, only relenting when her look turned into a glare, "If it comes down to either you or me, then I will save your life. I'm not going to bend on that." He stated firmly, "Besides that, I have no intention of leaving. I've looked for you for too long to lose you like that."

She kept up her glare a while longer before relaxing. It was probably the best that she was going to get, and she could hardly hold it against him without becoming a hypocrite herself.

So be it. If that was his stance, then she would ensure he never be in that position.

"Very well," She brought his head in for a deep kiss, smirking when this time she was able to take him by surprise, "Now then, let's go make our appearance."

* * *

_Several hours later - The Presidium_

The Citadel was separated into several sections - The Central Ring was home to the Presidium, a massive park-like complex that contained the various offices of the galactic government, as well as embassies for each respective race. Five large arms extending from the central ring was the home of the residential and commercial districts of the Citadel, known as the Wards.

Walking across the plaza, Arturia felt her lips twitch upward as she glanced behind herself. It was clear that this was the first time that Kaiden, Ashely, and Jenkins had ever been to the Citadel. The Gunnery Chief and Lieutenant at least attempted to hold onto a modicum of discipline, even if they were failing, while the Corporal had long abandoned any attempt of hiding his awe, and was the most vocal in his appreciation of the advanced station.

While the Alliance had been part of the galactic community for a number of years, seeing other species wasn't a very common sight, especially as one got closer to Earth. Here though, it was humanity that was in the minority, and the sheer diversity of species made for a breathtaking sight, and that was before taking in the station itself.

Much like Arcturus Station, the sheer size and contents of the place made it difficult sometimes to remember that they were on a space station - an artificial construct suspended in space. Looking up was all it took to remember that fact though, as the long arms of the Citadel could be seen, each brimming with the lights that indicated life.

While she preferred being closer to nature, to the villages and towns of her youth, she would readily admit that what was created here was worthy of praise.

Once the Normandy had docked the group of six had swiftly made their way to the embassies, each in the standard blue dress uniform of the Alliance military. They then were led by Anderson as they made their way to the Citadel Tower.

As they walked, Arturia was vividly aware of Shirou's presence directly behind her and to the side. While she would normally be fine with this, and would welcome his closeness, she was very much aware of his tense stance and alert gaze that scanned anybody that strayed too close while the others admired the scenery.

Though she was exasperated that he had decided to become her bodyguard, she let it be. She knew it wasn't that he thought her weak or incapable (at least, she sincerely hoped that he didn't think that. For his own sake), and more that the thought of losing her had terrified him.

If it helped, she would remain silent, though she hoped it wouldn't take long for him to calm down. They were both N7's - any mission they were to undertake was bound to involve risks, and it was unlikely that they would be able to be in the same squad all the time.

Several minutes of walking later they arrived at the base of the Citadel Tower where a man in a white suit was waiting for them, reviewing some documents as he did so. He looked up as they walked towards him, and his face immediately turned into a scowl as he stood and began walking towards them.

"Captain." He greeted curtly, "I thought I advised you to stay away from this hearing?" He asked in a clipped tone.

"These are soldiers under my command," Anderson replied, seemingly not bothered by the accusation, "if they are to be interviewed then I reserve the right to be present during said interview."

"Yes, because that is absolutely the reason you wish to be here for that," The man retorted sarcastically. "But then I suppose I should have anticipated as much. At least you all arrived on time."

Anderson ignored him, turning to the others and gestured to the man, "This is Ambassador Udina," He explained, "It's thanks to him that we're able to meet with the Council this quickly. Usually a request like this would take weeks."

Udina scoffed, "Weeks? You're being rather generous. With as many petitions and requests the Council receives you'd be lucky to even glimpse them within a month. Arranging this took several favors from me," He sighed in aggravation, "But more than that, I believe that the Council is interested in what you have to say." His gaze turned into a small glare as he glanced at both of the Commander's, "The destruction of priceless technology has a tendency to do that." He stated caustically.

It was only with much effort and past experience that Arturia was able to prevent showing her annoyance. Before she could say anything, the man continued.

"Well, come along then," He turned and made his way into the Tower proper, making his way to the elevator as the rest of the group filled in after him.

"Now, the Council has already read your report," He informed them as the elevator travelled upward, "But due to the nature of the hearing they're expecting to hear from you directly." He focused his glare on them, "Do _not_ make us look bad. We've made a lot of progress to get a human on the Council, and this has the potential to throw our progress back years!"

Ah, yes. The world of politics, how she did not miss it, even if she was confident in her ability to navigate it. The military had its fair share of it, but it paled in comparison to what politicians dealt with.

"W-wait," Jenkins spoke up looking confused. "We're here to report on the Geth and that Saren guy, right? What does that have to do with a seat on the Council?"

"Our image," Arturia replied easily, the answer earning snorts of derision from Kaiden and Ashely as Udina leveled a glare at Jenkins, "It has to do with how they view humanity." She explained, "What we can accomplish, how we solve issues, and what we can contribute. How we react during this will contribute to their opinion of us, for better or worse."

She heard Chief Williams give a snort of disgust, " _Politics…_ " only to fall silent when Udina turned his glare onto her. Arturia simply shrugged.

Call it what you will, but there was a reason why 'politics' existed despite so many people claiming to hate it.

"It's more valid than you would think." She countered, her calm explanation helping ease the tension growing within the elevator, "If humanity is given a seat while being seen as weak or dishonorable by the various races, whether it's true or not, then that reputation would in turn affect the entire Council. Countless people would see this as an opportunity, and attempt to take advantage."

Most would fail, but a reputation was a fragile thing indeed. Difficult to build up in a positive way, and so very prone to collapse. And even attempts could be costly.

She turned towards the Ambassador curiously, "However, I didn't think the Council was willing to open a seat to another race at this time?"

She felt Udina's eyes appraise her as he grunted in acknowledgment, "You are correct." He admitted, "One needs to have provided some 'extraordinary service' to the Citadel before they are willing to consider it. However, it's only a matter of time, and any mistakes that happen here could ruin much of the progress we've already made."

Before he could say more the elevator opened, and the group slowly filed out into the spacious room. Trees and plants lined the path up to a raised dias, and she could see three figures at the end of the room with the hologram of a turian standing next to them.

Arturia smoothed her expression while adjusting her stance, an air of authority and charisma settling over her. Meeting the ruler of another country was different from meeting a superior, or a military leader. It had been many years since she had met with another such person, but old habits smoothly slid into place as they walked up the path.

* * *

_Council Chambers - Udina's POV_

As frustrated as Udina was with the two Commanders, he would (reluctantly) admit that they handled themselves well in front of the Council.

Commander Pendragon comfortably took the lead, and he was... Surprised and impressed with the grace and comfort that she had while giving her report, her composure enough to make any politician envious. He had worked with the military in the past and had been fully prepared for the diplomacy of a sledgehammer.

This unexpected boon was almost enough to make him forgive the Commanders for completely screwing up the mission.

_Almost._

Commander Emiya seemed content to let her lead, only filling in when necessary, which was probably just as well. Though he conducted himself well enough, to a trained politician he might as well have been an open book.

"While we are, of course, grateful that both of you are alright, the news that you bring is rather concerning." The Turian Councilor, Sparatus, stated, his mandibles flaring.

"Indeed." The Salarian Councilor, Valern, cut in. "Nihlus, a Spectre, dead. Invasion of Geth. Accusations against a Spectre. And destruction of the original mission objective." The amphibian alien glared at Commander Emiya intently, "Was it truly necessary to destroy the device?"

_Well, that's my cue._

"The Commander had just finished disabling several bombs that were left behind by the Geth," Udina interjected bluntly. "And we have no record of a Prothean Beacon acting in this manner. I hardly think that we can hold him against reacting with extreme force at the sight of such a hostile situation."

_Hmph._ Years of training allowed him to say that with a straight face.

Udina had every intention of holding such an idiotic move against him. With bombs already set, why would the Geth feel the need to trap the Beacon as well? Prothean relics were easily some of the most valuable items in the galaxy. Ruins, devices, weaponry... All would easily reach into the millions. But a working Beacon? A terminal connected to what had been the Prothean network?

Billions. And that was on the cautious side.

Valern frowned at that response, though Udina was pleased to note that Sparatus at least was nodding in understanding.

"Now with all due respect," Udina stated pointedly, "I would ask that we focus on what the meeting is supposed to be about."

"For once, I would agree with the Ambassador," The hologram sneered, and Udina glared at the image of Saren Arterius.

"I was in the middle of something rather important when I was requested to be here, and I would much like to get back to getting some actual work done." He finished with a mocking look towards the humans.

"Please," The asari, Councilor Tevos, requested firmly, "We are here to determine the truth of what happened. The Geth have not traveled outside of the Veil in over two centuries, and for them to make such a provocative move is extremely concerning."

"Furthermore, Saren is a trusted Spectre." Sparatus stated, his eyes narrowing. "Even if we were to disregard the screening process and psychological evaluations, he has still proved his loyalty many times over during his decades of service. As such I must agree, our focus should be on the Geth and their incursion."

Udina fought down a growl. This was the SECOND time that Saren was involved in the prevention of the Alliance putting a human in the ranks of the Spectres. There was no way he was going to let that go uncontested!

"That is preposterous!" He snapped indignantly, "We have an eye witness that was able to identify Saren on site, clearly not worried about the presence of the Geth! The witness had no contact with Saren in the past, and therefore no reason to blame him unless he truly was there!"

"Yes, we heard from the report," Valern replied calmly. "The witness described a turian that looked like Saren, yes, but this was at a distance. Humans often have a hard time identifying specific turians, and Saren, while distinctive, is hardly unique." He shrugged, "one-hundred percent verification impossible."

"If I may," Saren interjected, the anger in his voice easily heard, "I resent these accusations. Nihlus was a fellow Spectre. No, more than that." He glared at all of them, "He. Was. A. Friend. The idea that I would kill for no reason is completely ludicrous!"

Anderson stepped forward this time, "He was shot at point blank, forensics evidence can easily corroborate this." He retorted, "Who else would he let that close to him but a friend?"

Saren scoffed, "You seem to enjoy insulting Spectre's Captain, first me and now Nihlus." He sneered, "Despite your assumptions, Nihlus did have friends outside of me. I assure you, it is not only I that shall be mourning his loss."

Udina gave Anderson a glare, gesturing for him to stand down. If he remained silent, he could prevent the man from making a fool of himself…

"In fact, I find it odd that you are once again involved in another situation where humanity is making false charges against me." Saren continued mockingly, "And this time you've involved others." He turned to the male Commander, "Was destroying the Beacon not enough for you Commander Emiya? At least Anderson's previous attempt had been less costly. It's clear you have much to learn from the man."

_Why do I even bother trying?!_ Udina thought desperately as the incensed captain continued to ignore him. At least the Commander didn't seem bothered by the accusations, even if he was staring intently at the hologram.

"The Beacon had been tampered with!" The man snapped, only for the Spectre to laugh.

"Of course, shift the blame to cover up their failures. It worked so well last time, why not now?" He replied sarcastically.

Just as Anderson was about to retort to that…

An oppressive aura appeared, seemingly pressing down on everybody, silencing Anderson and appearing to startle the Councillors and himself. Just as quickly the pressure vanished, and Pendragon stepped forward.

"Excuse me," Commander Pendragon stated, her words polite and yet hard with authority. "I believe that we have gotten off track." She glanced at both the Captain and then the Spectre. "The purpose of this meeting has no connection to whatever previous quarrel you have with the Captain."

The Spectre scoffed, "On the contrary, that is all that this meeting is - a continuation of a grudge your dear Captain has against me, and nothing else." He growled dismissively.

The Commander merely tilted her head, "That will be for the Council to determine." She narrowed her eyes, "As you are currently the accused, I believe it goes without saying that until your innocence is proven, your word is of limited value.

Udina could have wept. SOMEBODY was actually thinking rationally!

Saren was about to retort when Councilor Tevos spoke up, "The Commander is correct, an accusation of this level is rather dire." She acknowledged, "However, I'm afraid that Saren has been able to provide evidence of him and his ship being nowhere near Eden Prime during the Geth assault. While hardly conclusive, I'm afraid it does lend credence to his claims."

"Of course it does." He replied smugly, "This whole thing is obviously a waste of time for both the Council and myself!"

The dismissal of the Council and the words of Saren himself seemed to cause the Captain to finally lose his temper. "You can't hide behind the Council forever! And we haven't even addressed Pendragon's vision. The one caused by the Beacon!" He then gestured for her to speak.

_Anderson…_ If Udina was any less trained then he was, he would be shaking with anger by now. He should have told the idiot not to bring up that detail, but he had thought it was obvious!

Oh, he was sympathetic to the Commander's plight. Failed the mission, fighting dead civilians, Spectre murdered, priceless artifact blown up…

Well, clearly she had been through a lot. And it wasn't unusual for soldiers under such stressful circumstances to experience… traumatic images and the like. Udina understood and didn't hold it against them, and would be willing to get the best of help for such a promising Commander. But there was no need to actively bring such a thing to the forefront in the middle of a hearing like this!

The Commander breathed out slowly before replying, "Yes, as we stated in our report, after I was knocked out by the Beacon I experienced numerous images of a unique nature. I believe it is possible that the Beacon was attempting to impart a message. A warning perhaps. I'm not sure of the details of how that is possible, but… I saw machines. Possibly Geth. Butchering everybody they came across, entire cities even. I'm still unsure of the meaning behind all of it, but that was the clearest thought."

Whatever the Councilor's thought of the 'vision' was interrupted when Saren barked out a laugh, "Are we allowing dreams into evidence now?" He scoffed, "And how exactly would you like me to defend against this kind of testimony? Shall I wait until I have a dream as well?"

Sparatus nodded in agreement, "I agree. Our decisions must be based on facts and evidence, not imagination."

"I concur," Valern agreed, "If you have nothing to add then we'll conclude this hearing."

Anderson looked like he had something he wanted to say, but it appeared that he was _finally_ acknowledging Udina, and remained silent.

Councilor Tevos nodded, "Very well. The Council finds no connection between Saren and the Geth. Although Nihlus was lost, we are grateful that none of your own men were lost in this venture. We shall discuss the matter of the destroyed Beacon further with the Alliance at a later date."

Saren smirked, "I'm grateful to see that justice has been served." The hologram flickering and vanishing a moment after that.

With that dismissal, Udina spun on his heel and led the group out of the tower in silence. The moment they were outside he saw Anderson open his mouth to say something and he immediately cut him off, "Not here." He ordered.

He had so many things he wanted to say right now, and it would be… preferable if they were behind closed doors when that occurred.

The walk to the Alliance embassy was tense and quiet, and Udina didn't bother to fill it. Thankfully the walk was relatively short, and they quickly filed into the room.

Just as he rounded on the Captain, Commander Pendragon stepped forward. "Excuse me Ambassador, but would it be possible for me to have a few moments with the Captain in private?"

He blinked in surprise, some of his anger evaporating at the unexpected request. He took note of the look in her eyes and noted the hard look in them.

It was hidden, but it appeared that somebody was just as angry as he.

He grunted, "Very well." He agreed stiffly, gesturing to an empty office.

She nodded, "Thank you." She replied gratefully, marching for the door without looking at or addressing the Captain.

Anderson seemed to wince, "I'll, uh, be right back," walking towards the office as well.

The rest of the group looked at the now closed door awkwardly until Udina let out a huff, making his way to his desk.

"So, uh… Well, I guess that that didn't go very well?"

Udina rounded on the young Corporal Jenkins.

Also known as the new target for his growing anger.

* * *

_Anderson's POV_

Anderson closed the door before turning and looking at the Commander. He couldn't help but wince once more.

He and Ector had been friends for years, starting when the two began at boot camp - first as rivals, then as friends - and had remained close ever since. He had been there when Ector's first son had been born, had comforted him when his wife had died, had been comforted by the man when his own wife divorced him, and helped support him when he took in little Arturia.

As such, he had been there since the beginning with Arturia, and had seen her grow into the fine woman she was. She had never been under his command before - she had insisted on it, as she didn't want any sign of favoritism. The only reason she allowed it now was that she was at the point where her achievements spoke for themselves - nobody could claim that her advancements were anything but of her own merit.

And one of the things that he knew about her was her temper.

She was always an odd child, more mature and dedicated than the rest of her peers by far, and there were many that claimed that she never got angry. He, in fact, had thought this for quite some time, and had thought that Ector and Kay were pulling his leg before he saw it for himself.

Most people, when they became angry, made it known. Whether visually or vocally. Depending on how angry they became they'd become belligerent, they'd shout, they'd want to fight, or whatever else. There were other signs, but that was the gist.

Arturia, for lack of a better description, took charge.

When she became angry, it was almost like a curtain would lift. All subservience would vanish, regardless of rank or position, and for all intents and purposes it would feel as if SHE were the one in charge.

This had happened more when she was younger, and he had read several reports where she had essentially taken over command of her squad from the current commanding officer.

And the thing was… more often than not, the commanding officer let it happen.

Arturia had a presence about her. Call it charisma, call it confidence... Whatever it was, there was just something about her that made a person acknowledge her. Even when she was younger, when she gave an order there was something that made you automatically want to obey it.

Most officers learned how to do this after years of experience, but sometimes people were born with that talent, needing merely to refine it.

The first time he had seen her display it had been during a training exercise only a couple weeks into boot camp, where the man who was actually in charge was a pretentious fool. She had held her tongue half the day, and while she had performed her own tasks admirably the actions of the squad leader resulted in in-fighting amongst the entire squad. When she had finally snapped she quickly took over the entire squad and had them all listening to her despite their prior discontent, and they ended up winning the exercise.

As she was promoted that charisma made its presence shown, and the number of times he had seen her angry had lessened considerably. For what reason would she lower the curtain and hide who she was? For most of the time, she was now already in charge.

So of course he recognized, walking into the office that was empty with only one exception, that she was indeed angry with him, and did not care if he was her superior or not.

"Arturia," He greeted cautiously, "What did -"

"What happened between you and Spectre Arterius?" She interjected bluntly, staring at him firmly, and he couldn't help but remember how Kay often called her "Her Majesty" when she was like this.

"You're smart," She continued without letting him speak, "You've dealt with politicians before - you're a Captain, you must have. Yet in there you let him provoke you, and you let yourself react to such provocation. Because of that, you allowed him to control the conversation, the results of such then reduced your own credibility with the Council."

"So I repeat, what happened between you two?"

He could have pushed back. He outranked her and was nearly twice her age after all… But honestly, this was something he should have talked with her about before, and it was even more important now since it now involved her.

He let out an explosive breath, walking over to an empty seat and collapsed into it, feeling every bit of his forty-six years. After a second she followed suit and sat into a seat across from him.

"What do you know of the Spectres?" He started, watching as her brows furrowed minutely in confusion. Still, she answered.

"They're agents of the Council." She recited, "Their purposes and objectives vary depending on what the Council needs. I believe that they are chosen amongst talented members of the military, the 'elite' of the field. The only authority they answer to is the Council itself."

Anderson nodded, "Correct, though there is an important factor that you've missed." He stated, "All Spectre's are, at this time, members of one of the three Council races."

Arturia didn't seem to react, didn't demand to know what that had to do with her question. She simply waited for him to explain, something that he appreciated.

"The Alliance has been growing rapidly over the last couple of decades, and with that growth comes the desire for more influence on the galactic scale, something that they've been pushing for quite some time." He explained, growing more comfortable with the familiarity of the topic. "Though their end goal is a seat on the Council, they believe a stepping stone to that goal is to have a member of humanity become a member of the Spectre's." He shrugged, "They're not wrong. To that end, the Council sent Nihlus to join us on our latest mission to Eden Prime, to observe you and Commander Emiya and determine whether he approved of the idea of either of you becoming Spectre's."

THAT got a reaction, if the widening of her eyes meant anything. Those same eyes quickly narrowed in thought, and he could practically hear the thoughts as she analyzed her past conversations with the Spectre.

Before he could ask for her thoughts she spoke up once more, "As intriguing as that information is..." Her gaze pierced his once more, "What does that have anything to do with you and Saren?"

He looked at her wryly, "You didn't think that Emiya and you were the first people to be scouted as Spectre's, did you?"

He could tell that she immediately realized what he was referring to. Not that it was that great a leap to make - It wouldn't be a boast for him to say that he was one of the best that the Alliance had to offer (despite what Ector said to the contrary). An acknowledged war hero, one of the most decorated of the Alliances special forces, and the first graduate of the N7 program.

"It was nearly twenty years ago." He explained, "The mission…" _blue eyes, natural blonde hair - a rarity in the 22nd century - and a sharp mind. Somebody he cared for, that might have grown into more had they let it._ "... Well, that doesn't matter anymore." He brushed it aside, the sudden memory filling him with nostalgia, "Saren was the Spectre in charge of assessing me. However, half-way through the mission he broke from the plan, destroying much of the factory we were in, and killing most of the workers. He then reported to the Council that I had been the one to do it."

He closed his eyes as the memories assaulted him once more, having to focus on not clenching his hands, "I don't know if the Council believed him or not, but in the end it was more than enough to keep me from joining the Spectre's."

"Twenty years ago…" He looked up at hearing Arturia's murmur, her eyes distant before focusing on him once more, "Kahlee?" Despite asking, her voice softened in understanding.

He coughed, feeling awkward as he felt his cheeks flush slightly. He didn't think that Arturia would actually remember and connect the dots from just that.

Though considering how many times Ector invited her over in a misguided attempt to push them together, perhaps it wasn't that much of a surprise...

"That's not relevant," He stated quickly, brushing it aside, "Regardless, that's my 'history' with Saren, and I've kept an ear to the ground wherever he is concerned. He's shown a clear disdain for the Alliance - for humanity in general - and has made no effort in hiding the fact that he doesn't care how many of us die."

"I see," She said softly, spending the next few minutes in silence as she thought, "So what do you believe our next step should be?" She asked, following suit when he stood up and walked to the door.

He hesitated, "I'm not sure," He admitted, "But our first step should be to talk with Udina. He's more familiar with things on the Citadel. He might have some ideas."

She nodded, "Very well," She then tilted her head at him and quirked her lips up in a ghost of a smile, "You should call Kahlee Sanders." She suggested with a knowing glint in her eye, causing him to stumble at the unexpected suggestion.

"Uhm, where did that come from?" He recovered, looking at her in bemusement.

She shrugged, "You're usually in a much better mood after you talked with her," She said with an air of innocence, "After what just happened with the Council, it would do you some good to hear from her." She continued, her expression portraying only professionalism. One that he didn't believe in the least.

She glanced at him and ignored his suspicious look, "I'm sure that she'd much prefer to hear from you than learning about what just happened through… Rumours." She stated calmly, and he snorted at her 'innocent' expression.

Her poker face was as good as ever, but he got the message. If Kahlee heard what happened from Ector, who knows what else he'd tell her...

"Very well," He acquiesced reluctantly, "I'll try to find some time in the next couple days to do so."

Her expression never changed, but something about her seemed to radiate smugness for several moments, and he shook his head.

They opened the door to rejoin the others, immediately gaining the attention of Ambassador Udina and the others. Udina appeared to be in the middle of a heated lecture with Corporal Jenkins, the latters desperation turning into relief at their approach, like a man who had just seen salvation.

Chief Williams and Lieutenant Alenko appeared to be doing their best to avoid the attention of the Ambassador, while Commander Emiya was leaning against the wall, his expression torn between amused and concerned.

The Captain walked back into the room and to Udina and prepared to weather another storm. "I apologize for the delay. What have we missed?"

* * *

_Shirou's POV_

The walk back to the Normandy was uneventful, and Shirou found himself going over everything that had occurred.

The Council hadn't believed them, and the discussion with Udina and Anderson afterwards hadn't yielded anything further. In the end they had been told that they were all given shore leave while the Ambassador talked to some of his sources, and that he'd get back with them once he had something.

He honestly didn't have a lot of faith in that, nor was he surprised by the decision of the Council. And even if he did believe that Udina could find answers, he didn't know the politician well enough to decide if he trusted him or not.

Already, Shirou was going through a list of people that he could talk to that might be able to tell him more about Saren. His time in the military had certainly not been idle, and he knew of multiple people that would be willing to provide info.

The Spectre had gone through a lot of trouble to do something with the Beacon, even attempting to blow up the evidence after. Why not take the device with him? The only thing Shirou could think of was that the Turian didn't have any more need for it, and didn't want even the slightest chance of somebody getting their hands on it.

Though part of his plan worked and the Beacon was destroyed (Still not feeling any guilt from that particular action. Not at all.) it had shown something to Arturia. Considering the extent of what Saren had done, Shirou highly doubted that he would be willing to let that lie, even if neither he nor Arturia had any idea what the vision meant.

Shirou would have been spurred to action regardless, but seeing as he was a threat to Arturia made him all the more determined.

Of course, now there was just the issue of trying to decide if he trusted Arturia's safety to anybody else while she was going through some more tests with Doctor Chakwas...

"Well, that was half of a day wasted." Shirou groused, taking the time to stretch stiff muscles as he contemplated the best way to bring up his plan. He and Arturia were by themselves once more, taking advantage of the privacy of the Conference Room on the Normandy. Since they weren't on a mission, and most of the crew were on shore leave, the room had been their best bet for privacy.

"Hmmm, I disagree." Arturia responded with a thoughtful look, causing Shirou to frown.

She focused on him and saw his expression, giving a little smile in response, "You don't have a lot of faith in politicians, do you?"

He was about to agree when a thought caused him to hesitate… Technically, SHE had been a politician, though he wasn't sure that the title of King really counted. Obviously there were good leaders out there - **she** existed after all - but he had far too much experience with the Clock Tower and the ruling magus's.

There was just something about knowing that the majority of the Clocktower didn't have an issue with experimenting on their own family that caused one's faith in political leaders to dwindle, just a bit...

Arturia saw his conflicted expression and laughed, bringing a hand up to cover her mouth as her eyes danced with mirth, the carefree sound causing him to relax.

"Though they did not say it, I believe that our report was sufficient to push the Council into looking into Saren on their own." She explained with a confident look the moment her laughter subsided.

"Really?" Shirou looked at her skeptically, folding his arms as he leaned against the wall, "We must have been in two different meetings. Mine went quite a bit different from yours," he remarked dryly.

She rolled her eyes, "The Systems Alliance is the youngest of the races to join the galactic community, and yet we've already established ourselves as a power. One that will only continue to grow." Her face became serious, "However small, we have evidence that Saren was involved in an assault against a peaceful colony aligned with humanity while at the same time working with the army of another nation. Something like that could very well be considered an act of war. Something as serious as that? I guarantee the Council will be worried."

Shirou frowned. It made sense, and had she stated so before the meeting he might have even believed it.

Well… Probably. He loved and trusted her, and would freely acknowledge that her knowledge of politics dwarfed his own. But once again, experience with the Clocktower made him… Wary.

And now, after the fact, it certainly looked like his paranoia was justified. So how could she say that things went well?

"If that's the case, then why didn't they say that they would investigate him?"

She sighed, and he could sense the traces of tiredness in it. "I agree, that is what I would have done were it one of my Knights." She admitted, "A public investigation would certainly delay whatever tasks that Knight was assigned, but it would uphold his honor in the eyes of the populace."

Her expression turned to one of distaste, "However, there are obviously other ways of going about it." she explained reluctantly, "By backing their own man, this allows them to create the illusion that the Spectre's are incapable of wrongdoing. Reputation is a powerful weapon in it's own right. Then, if the Spectre is guilty, they can be taken care of quietly." She shrugged, "The reputation of the Spectre's is upheld, and the Spectre simply vanishes."

He stared at her for a moment before shaking his head, "I don't know that I could ever become a politician." He confessed ruefully. He already knew that from watching Rin (who positively thrived in that sort of environment) but then stuff like this would happen and reaffirm it.

She looked contemplative for a moment, "In theory, it's not that different from fighting." She explained in a serious voice, her features taking on a lecturing look, "If you observe their first action, and are aware of what their motivation is, then you can reasonably predict what they'll do to reach their goals. The more you observe, the more you can refine what you predict they shall do down to the end result."

He raised an eyebrow at that, "And what kind of goal would cause them to act like this?" He asked wryly.

"The same as our own Ambassador of course," She stated in a matter of fact voice, "Each of them desire for their own respective races to prosper."

Seeing his confused look she expounded, "An alliance is formed when two groups see a mutual benefit in working with each other. Have you ever wondered why other races, like the Volus, don't have a seat on the Council?"

He shook his head. He was aware of the volus species - they were mostly merchants and bankers if he remembered right, not much in the way of a military. They were currently an associate race on the Citadel, much like the Alliance was.

Arturia continued, "It is because doing so would be completely one-sided." She shrugged, "It might seem harsh, but while the Volus would benefit greatly from joining the Council, they wouldn't provide anything to the Council that they aren't already doing as an associate member. Thus, of course the Council would hesitate over such an action. However, humanity is different. Despite being the newest to the galactic community our population is already vastly greater than many other species, our military has proven itself during the First Contact War and against the Batarians, and our economy is stable even without the aid of other species. Furthering ties with the Alliance would not only benefit the Alliance, but the Council races as well."

When put that way, it made sense. But if so, that only further confused him as to the Council's actions. He didn't say anything though, instead motioning for Arturia to continue.

"Even with the lack of evidence, the accusations we made against Saren should have caused more concern - an investigation at the least, considering the severity of what he is being accused of. Since it didn't, I can only assume the Council intends to investigate behind the scenes. If they don't, then that could only mean that he is more valuable for their goals than not." She scoffed, "Considering his actions and newfound connections to the Geth, I find that highly unlikely."

Silence reigned for several more seconds before Shirou eventually let out a small huff, "I hate to break it to you, but that is way more complicated than fighting," He said with a smile.

Sure, he recognized those steps, and when pointed out to him in such a way it made sense (He couldn't help but feel grateful that Arturia was a more patient teacher than Rin. The twin-tailed magus would no doubt have shot a Gandre at him in frustration.) but to apply them to situations outside of fighting... "I think I'll stick with fighting and engineering."

He was a sword. A description that most would find insulting, but one that he found rather apt. Trickery and deceit were things that he can and has had to do, but he felt most at ease when he was fighting to defend someone, or fixing things to help them.

Alas, not all problems in life were Thresher Maws that needed to be slain, and the universe was filled with shades of gray.

He jumped as he felt a pair of arms wrap around him from behind, and Arturia's chin rested on his shoulder. "Oh, I don't know," She murmured in a teasing tone, "You don't need to be a master of politics to be a good leader. You just need to make sure that you have somebody around that is. I personally think that you'd make a fine Queen."

Shirou balked in indignation, and he could feel Arturia laughing lightly behind him, "W-wait, Queen?" He protested, "What about King?!"

She sniffed, "Well obviously I was already the King," She reasoned, "If we were to be properly wed, then that would naturally make you the Queen."

He gave her a flat look, "I think there are a few more things involved in that."

"There usually is," She admitted easily, letting go of him to walk around him, giving him a teasingly superior look, "But what other title would you have if I didn't wish to relinquish the title of King? Especially after all that you did to convince me to not change my past?" Her lips twitched upward in a smile, but he could see the sincerity of her last statement in her softened eyes.

He scoffed, but internally couldn't help but feel happiness for how more relaxed and carefree she was as opposed to when he had first met her. During their hearing with the Council he could easily see the mask of the King that she portrayed to the world, and it was obvious that she was still every bit of the King that he had fallen in love with. But she was now no longer focused only on that, and was allowing herself to be a person as well.

She was happier. How could he not feel joy from that simple fact?

"So when exactly are we going out?" She suddenly asked him, causing him to stiffen in surprise.

"Wha- What?" He looked at her in confusion, the change in conversation taking him by surprise.

She cocked an eyebrow at him, "You did not believe that the Council would do anything regarding Saren," She pointed out, "despite this, you did not seem overly distressed. I assume that that means that you already had a course of action planned."

That was… Actually, that was pretty much true. But… "Didn't you say that you believe the Council will be investigating him?"

"I do." She agreed, "And yet **you** do not believe that." She shifted, looking him firmly in the eyes, "The Ambassador has already said he intends to look into things as well. If you have another avenue to look into, then I don't see anything wrong with doing so. Of course," Her eyes narrowed with sudden intensity, "If I am incorrect and you had no such plans, then we do still have shore leave, and you do still need to take me out on a date." She blushed lightly.

Now that was something that had completely slipped his mind till she mentioned it. Now that she had done so, he found himself extremely tempted… But no, business first.

Of course, he had no intention of suggesting that she remain behind, nor that he thought that she should. He had come a long way from his teenage self, and would rather save his arguments for a time when he could actually win them.

"Didn't Dr. Chakwas say that she wanted to go through a few more tests?" He asked cautiously.

Arturia huffed in aggravation, "If she had her way, I wouldn't have left the med-bay for a full week." She looked at him with a question in her eye, "I understand if this is something that would be easier to do on your own. But if possible, I would prefer to go with you."

… Well when she said it like that, how could he say no?

* * *

_Several hours later_

"Not that I am complaining, but is this information gathering or a date?"

Shirou looked at the pleased Arturia and the mostly eaten plates of food in between them, giving a huff of exasperation. "Information gathering... With benefits," He stated firmly, "When I do take you on a date, I want it to be planned, and not spur of the moment or by chance."

Arturia gave him a reassuring smile, "You know I'm not one for anything extravagant Shirou," She pointed out, and he nodded, hesitating slightly before answering in a low voice.

"You didn't have any dates when you were growing up," He stated confidently. Even if she had had the inclination, medieval courtship was a tad different from the current practice, "And I know you haven't had any since we came here. That means that the only date you've had was during the Holy Grail War." He gave her a sad smile, "Since this would be our first date here, I wanted to think of something special."

Their date during the Holy Grail War was important to him, but he would admit that it had been… Awkward.

Hey, he had been 17 years old at the time with no dating experience nor any parents to go for advice. The only person he could have talked to was Taiga and… Well, even he would admit that that would have led to some interesting results.

As such, could he be blamed for wanting to make sure that the first date he took her on in this new life was special?

She looked at him in surprise before acknowledging it with a smile, "Though it is hardly necessary, I am grateful." She admitted, her eyes bright in anticipation, "I will look forward to our date then."

A large man suddenly walked up to their private booth, "Well? How's the food?" He boomed with a cheerful smile, folding his well muscled arms, "Can I get ya anythin' else?"

Ah, right, they were here for information.

Shirou had spent some time reaching out to people that he knew without any luck. Either they didn't know anything about the experienced Spectre or he was unable to contact them. That had then led him to ' _The Open Maw_ ', a smaller bar found in the Bachjret Ward.

Their host was a large man with thick hair and beard, both a dirty blonde color, his large gut doing nothing to hide the fact that he was a strong individual. The most significant feature though was the large acid burns that covered half his face and descended down past his shirt, presumably down to his leg if his limp was any indication.

"No, we're good," Shirou stated, looking at the many already empty plates with some amusement before looking at the large man, feeling exasperated, "But if possible, I would like to talk to you about those questions now." He said dryly.

"Bah, food before business. Don't want to mix the two, that'd cause indigestion or some crap." He stated brusquely, waving Shirou's concerns aside. "And as I said Commander, your meals are for free. Well," He corrected himself, "Now you and your lady."

Arturia smiled happily, "A true gentleman." She complimented generously, clearly pleased at the idea of free meals.

Shirou sighed, "We're here for business, not pleasure Kunio." Though he would admit that the food was pretty good. He might have to compare recipes... "And I know I've told you that you don't need to call me Commander anymore - It's been years since you've been under me!"

Kunio scoffed, "Yeah, I think ya mentioned that a time or two," He agreed lazily, "But I also recall ya riskin' yer life fer the whole squad." He pointed to the burns, "Were it not fer you, I reckon I'd be buried at Akuze instead of here." He grinned lazily at the now scowling Shirou and noted the interested look the lady gave his Commander.

Kunio couldn't help but smirk. He knew the Commander. He might be here for info, but he never knew the Commander to so comfortably take to somebody. And he was! he'd been watchin' his old leader interact with the lady for a while now, and he'd gamble his left kidney that the Commander was actually interested in the lass! Well with that, what kinda friend would he be if he didn't do his best to push the two together?

Besides, they looked cute together.

"But I suppose it looks like yer 'bout done." The big man concluded, leaving temporarily to drag a chair over to their booth and plopping himself down. He then fiddled with his Omni-tool for a few seconds before grunting in satisfaction.

"There." He said in a pleased tone, "Now we won't be listened in on." He looked at the two and his expression changed to complete seriousness, "So what questions do you have for ol' Kunio?"

Corporal Kunio Fujimura - after the events of Akuze, he had been honourably discharged due to injuries incurred. In the wake of that incident he had gathered what money he could and moved to the Citadel, opening up a bar in the process. It was there that he started becoming more involved in the... Family business.

The Fujimura group had grown quite a bit from a small yakuza group they used to be in Japan. While still small in comparison to others on the galactic scale, they had definitely carved themselves a small niche here at the Citadel, and Shirou found them to be reliable sources of information.

Being a hero required far more than just strength and fighting skill. With how large the world had become, and especially with how many of the incidents that he wished to assist in or prevent were hidden, creating an information network had been crucial.

His first 'contact' would technically be Rin. A dear friend and a master of maneuvering around the Clocktower, she had been able to point him to areas that were suffering but were beneath the notice of most other magus's, and from there he had met Professor El-Melloi, a rare exception amongst magus's. While the two never became close, they still had a deep respect for one another. As time had gone on he made even more friends - from various members of the Church and the assistance he gave on Dead Apostle Hunts, researchers amongst the Atlas Institute, and even a number of humans that weren't connected to magus's at all, such as his surrogate sister, Taiga.

As the granddaughter to the leader of the Fujimura Group, Taiga had been willing to provide yakuza resources that were impossible to get from most magus, such as fake ID's. Of course, the discussion of WHY he needed stuff like that had been… Stressful, and he always had been a terrible liar.

(Long story, but it had resulted in him having to reveal the existence of magecraft, and owing The Tiger unlimited meals in compensation. That had been an exhausting day...)

It was because of his lack of connections in this new life that he had decided to join the military. While he preferred the freedom that being a mercenary gave, with no credentials, contacts, or reputation, being a mercenary was a foolish venture.

Now, after years of the military, he once again had people he could ask for help and information.

Shirou leaned forward, "I want to know whatever you can find on a Spectre. Saren Arterius."

Kunio squinted at Shirou, giving a grunt, "A Spectre?" He asked incredulously, "That's bigger shit than I was thinkin' you'd be in Commander. You sure you wanna make an enemy out of one of em?"

Shirou frowned, "I'm afraid that it isn't much of a choice anymore." He replied dryly.

"Sure it is," Kunio disagreed with a small smirk, "it's called ya ignore whatever it is that he done to ya and mind your own britches." He barked out a laugh, "But knowin ya, that really ain't an option. Well you're in luck, you ain't the first one to be askin around about that guy."

"Really?" _Now that was interesting._ "Who?" He asked with interest.

Kunio raised his hands defensively, "Now now, I can't be tellin ya that. Client confidentiality and all that shit. But it means that most of the info is already gathered, so this won't take long at all."

Shirou frowned, but acquiesced. Before he could say anything, Kunio continued, "Though I could let the other feller know that there's another interesting party," He mused, "And if he were so interested, I could help arrange a meetin' for you two." He looked between the two of them before including, "I can at least tell ya that he ain't a fan of the fanged Spectre."

The two Commander's glanced at each other for a moment, and Kunio barely refrained from bursting into laughter. The two were already communicating without words like a married couple.

"Ok," Shirou decided, looking at the large man once more. "We'd like to get the information first, but we're willing to meet with this other guy."

"Excellent!" He boomed with a smile, "I'll have all that info gathered for ya tomorrow then. I'll email the cost to ya." He gestured at Shirou who acknowledged it.

"That's fine." Shirou said with a smile "Thanks Kunio, I really appreciate it."

"Hmph, It's my job, ain't it?" The man gave him a genuine smile, "Now get on then!" He gestured for them to leave, "Apparently I've got some stuff ta work on now." He leaned down next to Shirou's ear, "And bring yer lady friend again some time Commander. I can talk you up, help you get hooked up." He whispered with a wink, "Though knowin' you, I'm sure you can do it on own, but a little backup never hurt, aye?" He finished with a smirk.

Shirou felt himself stumble on air and attempted to stammer out a reply when the larger man burst out laughing, shoving him towards the door as he headed to the back of the bar.

"What did he say?" Arturia asked curiously as she watched the man disappear behind a door, his laughs trailing behind him, and Shirou shook his head.

"N-not important." Well, if they wanted word to get out that they were dating, then… Mission accomplished? Kunio was hardly a gossip, what with being a part time info broker, but on stuff like this he didn't have much of a filter.

The two of them walked in companionable silence for a while - the sights and sounds of the Citadel flowing around them. Unlike the Presidium, the Wards didn't have a day/night cycle, the buzz of activity remaining a constant despite the approaching late hour.

They walked in the general direction of the docks, not feeling any particular urgency. With none of Shirou's other potential contacts answering his calls yet, they didn't have much else to do at the moment.

Spending time with his Saber in such a relaxed environment caused Shirou to think back to those rare instances in the Holy Grail War. The surge of nostalgia immediately brought to mind a particular event.

They didn't _need_ to do anything - he was serious in that he wanted his first date with Arturia to be something special with her. But this is something that he knew she would love, and if it made her happy then how could he not?

"Are you alright with making one more stop?"

She looked at him curiously but didn't say anything negative, so he took that as an affirmative, swiftly moving with purpose in a particular direction with Arturia following close behind.

* * *

"What is this place?" Arturia asked with curiosity as she looked around the spacious white room, though her attention kept returning to the walls and the items they held.

Against the wall were numerous weapons. Guns, of course, but also a variety of older weaponry of various races. Asari biotic blades and whips, Kroger hammers, as well as a number of swords and spears that Arturia was very familiar with.

"This place runs simulations." Shirou explained, eventually deciding on a pair of short curved swords before moving to another section of weaponry. "Kinda like a paintball arena honestly, and the insides can match several different scenarios. Of course, for now I'd like to use it as simply a training room. They certainly have enough weapons for it." He finished with a light chuckle.

"I see." She mused as she picked out her own sword. "How did you know about this place?" She asked, her expression darkening slightly, "And how did that asari know you?"

Shirou grimaced even as he examined several different swords, "Siefe D'rialis is the equivalent to kendo champion amongst the asari," He explained as he took a cutlass and moved to look at the spears, "Working here is her regular job. I've sparred with her before and helped her out with her form, and she's told me that if I was ever around I should check the place out."

She was also one of the asari that he was pretty sure was hoping to win him over through friendship… While he was sorry to disappoint her, he would admit that she was a good friend. He really hoped that she found her special someone someday.

He grabbed a spear and slung it across his back, finally satisfied, and he walked over to the center of the room where Arturia was waiting patiently for him with her own sword already picked out. She looked at the variety of weapons he had chosen with open curiosity, but didn't ask about it.

The two of them had dressed into some spare uniforms before choosing their weapons, Arturia having grabbed a simple long sword, the dimensions of which he recognized closely matched that of Excalibur. Shirou, on the other hand, had a short spear across his back crossing with a cutlass, two short swords at his waist, and in his hands was a sword that matched the one in Arturia's hand.

He activated the timer and the two soon heard a countdown from ten, both of them focusing on the other. She didn't say anything, focusing instead on his stance and giving a small smile of approval, and he knew that she recognized it as the style that she had originally taught him. Beneath that, he could see the growing anticipation in her eyes.

The countdown hit zero, and in a flash Arturia was in front of him in a non-biotic charge, her sword clashing against his own as he kept up his guard and repelled her, shifting to block the next strike while dodging the kick she sent his way.

He was but a third-rate magus, unable to cast the simplest of spells to light a fireplace or repair a broken window. But in that which he was able to do, he had no equal.

With but a glance, he could 'Trace' a weapon, replicating it within the world within his soul known as Unlimited Blade Works. Doing so gave him knowledge of that weapon - what it was made out of and how it was created, up to the present time. It's entire history… Including how it was used by its past and current wielders.

Once seen he could use that weapon with the same skill of the past wielders, a fact that had saved both him and many others throughout the years, and had many calling him a cheat. But even this ability had its limitations.

A warrior needed to know his body. The ratio of the torso to the limbs, their center of gravity, the limits of flexibility. All were things that one learned instinctively over hours upon hours of practice.

While Tracing could allow him to mimic the abilities of their past wielders, it was flawed due to the simple fact that he was not them. Perhaps he would overextend on a lunge because he had longer arms, or perhaps he would twist in a way his legs were not expecting, pulling a muscle in the middle of a fight (or worse).

Thus he desired to rectify this flaw, to not fully rely on the skill of others forever.

He started with the style that his love tried to teach him so long ago - that of a plain longsword. Once he had developed to a level he deemed sufficient, he moved onto a throwing spear (he had never fully gotten over dying from that fight with that Irish Hero of old). From talwars to rapiers, cutlasses to glaives. He never reached anywhere close to _her_ level, but instead became talented at many.

His ability to swap between weapons, using a mixture of styles he either copied or had learned himself, helped carry him through many of his battlefields throughout the years, using the skills that he Traced as a template to boost his skill as opposed to depending on them.

Though his abilities were now limited, he did not let his physical skills diminish over the years.

After a few moments of sparring, Arturia moved into position to disarm him. Instead of resisting like most would he let it happen, following through with the motion to quickly grab the spear, twirling it in an arc to push her back. For a moment, he could see that the move took her by surprise.

It didn't stay for long of course, and just as quickly as it had appeared it was replaced with the thrill of a challenge, and he prepared himself for the sudden onslaught.

As skilled as he was, he doubted that he would win - but that hardly mattered. To him, this was the culmination of a dream that had started so long ago.

On Eden Prime they had already fought together, but this was fighting in the same manner of how they had years before, where she would spar with and train him.

It had started to help him become strong enough to stand by her side in battle, as he was not content to simply stand aside while she and others fought. But as time went on it became their way of bonding with each other.

She wasn't a Servant anymore, so it wasn't exactly the same… but here he was, able to fight at her level. Proof that he was now strong enough to fight at her side, that he was strong enough to protect her just as well as she protected him.

As he blocked another strike and made to move on the offensive, he allowed all other worries to flow from him as he focused solely on the fight and her.

This was his Avalon, these moments that he now had with her. For years he had searched with only her swords in his soul and the memory of her to keep him going. And now that they were together, he knew that he and Arturia would destroy whatever attempted to separate them again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Notes:
> 
> I apologize for this taking so long to write out. I have no plans on forgetting this story. I have many really good ideas for future events and how I want them to play out, and I'm actually really excited for when they come up. This chapter, however, I didn't really have any good ideas for… Because of that, it was such a struggle to write it down. And yet it's a necessary chapter to write in order to reach the chapters I do want to write about. Add that to how… Difficult this year has been, for a multitude of reasons, and that is the reason for why it has been so long. Don't worry, I won't bore anybody with details. Just be aware that though it might take some time, I have no intention of dropping this, nor any other, of my stories.
> 
> In the end, I'm not sure how I feel about this one, so I truly hope that everybody enjoys it regardless of my own hesitation.
> 
> I'd like to thank my sisters, CaptainDarkElf and CrazedWeirdo, as well as my brother Autumnstar, for reading through this chapter and reviewing it for me. I am truly grateful for their assistance. I'd also like to thank all of those who gave reviews - I find them very enjoyable to read, and I think it's safe to say that they help keep me going.
> 
> I worked hard to make sure that this was ready for Christmas Eve, this and a chapter for 'My Miraculous Academia'. I guess that these two chapters can be considered my Christmas present to all of you. Anyways, I hope that everybody enjoys the Holiday's, and I thank you for your patience. Until next time!


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